Published for Austin FC II fans — October 2026
By Toxlay Sports Editorial Team · Last updated October 23, 2026
⚽ Austin FC II Fans — Your Champions Own the West!
FCito just put together the greatest regular season in MLS NEXT Pro history — a club-record 65 points, the league’s meanest defense, and a home semifinal this Sunday at Parmer Field. Black shirts, verde hearts — this is the week to wear the champions’ colors.
The Club
Austin FC II — FCito to the fans who pack Parmer Field — is the reserve team of MLS club Austin FC. Founded on December 13, 2022, and in action since 2023, the young Verde play in MLS NEXT Pro, the third tier of the U.S. soccer pyramid, in the Western Conference’s Frontier Division. Home is Parmer Field at St. David’s Performance Center in Austin, Texas — the first team’s $45 million training complex, and one of the most intimate, up-close grounds in American pro soccer. The colors are the parent club’s own: black and verde.
Most reserve teams take years to matter. FCito won the whole thing in year one. In the club’s inaugural 2023 season, Austin FC II lifted the MLS NEXT Pro Cup, beating Columbus Crew 2 3–1 in the final, conceding just one goal across the entire playoff run behind a defense that allowed a league-best 23 goals in 28 regular-season games — goalkeeper Damian Las kept a league-record 12 clean sheets. The 2023 Western Conference playoff title and the 2024 MLS NEXT Pro Invitational followed. The little grey star above the crest on the shirt is for that first Cup, and it was earned the hard way.
The man in the dugout now is Jason Shackell, only the club’s second-ever head coach. An Austin FC Academy coach since 2021, Shackell was handed the team on November 21, 2025, after Brett Uttley’s contract expired — and in his first season as a professional head coach he was named the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Coach of the Year. That is the FCito idea in one story: this club exists to move people up. More than 230 players league-wide have signed MLS first-team contracts after time in MLS NEXT Pro, and this summer Austin’s own No. 10 made the jump without leaving the building — more on him below.
And then there is the shirt. Ask anyone searching for the Austin FC II jersey in 2026 and they will describe the same thing: a black adidas shirt crossed by four vertical stripes of green diagonal hatching, the ATXFCII tree crest on the left chest, and the sponsor YETI in huge white block capitals across the middle. It is one of the boldest looks in the league — and on the league’s best team, it has become the uniform of a champion.
⭐ FAN FAVORITE
#10 Alastuey — Austin FC II Style Jersey
$59.99
The Best XI playmaker in black and verde — green hatched stripes, the giant white YETI and 10 on the back. Fan-inspired apparel made for FCito fans.
Last Season (2025): The Year FCito Fell Short
After the fairy tale of 2023, 2025 was the reality check. Austin FC II finished 9th in the Western Conference — 15th overall — with 10 wins, 8 draws and 10 losses, 35 goals scored and 36 conceded for 41 points. They missed the playoffs by a single place, a sharp comedown two years after winning the Cup, and a second straight postseason spent watching from home after 2024’s absence.
There was one shining constant: Spanish midfielder Jorge Alastuey led the team in scoring with 10 goals, the first of back-to-back seasons topping this team’s charts. But the campaign never caught fire, and when it ended the club let head coach Brett Uttley’s contract expire. The rebuild was trusted to one of their own — academy coach Jason Shackell, promoted in November 2025. What he did next is the story of this season.
Best Players Right Now
Jorge Alastuey — #10, midfielder. The star of this team, full stop. The Spanish playmaker — a Barcelona youth product who also passed through Napoli and ŁKS Łódź — led FCito in scoring for the second straight year with 9 league goals in 2026 after a team-high 10 in 2025, was named to the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Best XI, and posted a FotMob standout rating of 7.75. On July 31, 2026, Austin FC signed him to a first-team contract, and he has since started MLS matches for the senior side. The reserve team’s best player became a first-team player in the same building.
Diego Abarca — #7, midfielder. The second scoring engine: 8 league goals in 2026, the second-highest total on the roster. When Alastuey draws the attention, Abarca is the one who punishes teams — the quiet half of the most productive midfield pairing in the league.
Stefan Dobrijevic — #21, forward. The rookie finisher. Signed on February 6, 2026, as a SuperDraft pick out of Akron — on a contract through 2027 with a 2028 option — Dobrijevic scored 7 league goals in his first pro season. Draft picks are supposed to need time; this one produced immediately.
Jules Bery — #5, defender. The wall. Bery was named the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Defender of the Year and a Best XI selection, anchoring a defense that conceded a league-fewest 21 goals all season — and he still chipped in 4 assists going forward. The best defense in the league starts with No. 5.
Patrick Cayelli — #18, midfielder. The chief creator, with a team-leading 5 assists per FotMob. Another February 2026 SuperDraft signing, Cayelli is the metronome who turns Austin’s pressure into chances — the player whose name fills the assist column next to the famous strikers.
Ibrahima Sall — #22, forward. Signed in January 2026 from Italy’s SSD San Nicolò Notaresco, Sall wrote himself into club folklore on October 18: off the bench in the playoff quarterfinal, he scored the 58th-minute equalizer that turned the San Jose game — and the season — around.
Star Spotlight
July 31, 2026 — the No. 10 graduates. Best XI midfielder, two straight years as the team’s top scorer, and then the call every reserve player dreams about: Alastuey signed a first-team Austin FC contract in mid-season and went straight into MLS lineups, making eight starts in 13 MLS appearances. It is the clearest proof-of-pathway story in MLS NEXT Pro this year — the exact journey this club was built to create.
The streak — March to July 2026. Austin FC II lost their season opener. Then they simply stopped losing: a 15-match unbeaten streak, including a league-record 10 consecutive wins, back-to-back Team of the Month honors in May and June, and a nine-win heart of the run in which FCito outscored opponents 23–3. The playoff berth was clinched in Matchweek 23 — the earliest clinch in MLS NEXT Pro history. By midsummer, the only question left was how high the records would stack.
October 18, 2026 — the comeback that reopened the trophy cabinet. Austin’s first playoff match since the 2023 Cup run was going wrong: down 1–0 at home to San Jose Earthquakes II after Zach Bohane’s 24th-minute goal. Then the bench changed everything — Ibrahima Sall equalized on 58 minutes, and Patrick Gryczewski buried the winner in the 88th. A 2–1 quarterfinal win, Parmer Field shaking, and FCito’s first playoff victory since the night they lifted the Cup.
🔥 More Fan Favorites
More FCito stars, same black and verde.
This Season (2026): Best in the League
The numbers first, because they are historic. Austin FC II finished 1st in the Frontier Division, 1st in the Western Conference and 1st overall in MLS NEXT Pro: 28 played, 19 wins, 6 draws, just 3 defeats, 54 goals scored and only 21 conceded — a +33 goal difference that was the league’s best. The 65 points are a club record, eclipsing the 49 from the 2023 Cup-winning season, and they made FCito the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Regular Season Champions.
The record stack kept growing all year. Austin tied the league record for most regular-season wins (19), posted the league’s most shutouts (15) and fewest goals conceded (21), and clinched a playoff place in Matchweek 23 — earlier than any team in league history. The honors followed the numbers: Jason Shackell was named Coach of the Year in his first professional season, Jules Bery took Defender of the Year and a Best XI place, and Jorge Alastuey joined him in the Best XI. After missing the playoffs in 2024 and 2025, the 2023 champions came back and took the entire league.
Now comes the part that matters. As the No. 1 overall seed, Austin hosts every playoff match it plays in 2026. The quarterfinal is already in the books — the 2–1 comeback over San Jose Earthquakes II on October 18 — and the semifinal is this Sunday at Parmer Field against LAFC2, the No. 6 seed that survived Houston on penalties. Win, and the Western Conference Final comes to Austin too; win again, and MLS NEXT Pro Cup lands at Parmer Field, because the Cup is hosted by the finalist with the most regular-season points — and nobody has more than FCito’s 65. The road to the trophy runs through Austin. All of it.
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Mark Your Calendar
Sunday, October 25, 2026 — vs LAFC2, Parmer Field (7:30 p.m. CT). The Western Conference Semifinal. The No. 6 seed arrives hot after eliminating Houston Dynamo 2 on penalties, but the league’s best team is at home, where the trophy road runs this year. Tickets via austinfc.com; the match streams live on OneFootball and MLSNEXTPro.com.
October 30 – November 1, 2026 — Western Conference Final. Beat LAFC2 and FCito hosts again at Parmer Field as the highest remaining seed, one win from a second MLS NEXT Pro Cup final. The opponent comes out of the Portland Timbers2 – Ventura County FC semifinal.
November 6–8, 2026 — MLS NEXT Pro Cup. The championship match is hosted by the finalist with the highest regular-season points total — Austin’s league-best 65 points mean the Cup final would be played at Parmer Field if FCito gets there. Two wins from a second star. Every playoff match streams live on OneFootball.com and MLSNEXTPro.com.
Biggest Rivalries — The Wars
1. Houston Dynamo 2 — the Texas Showdown. The in-state war Houston’s own site bills as the Texas Showdown, and 2026 delivered three rounds of it. On April 12 at Parmer Field, Arthur Sousa put Houston ahead in the 61st minute — and Jorge Alastuey equalized from the penalty spot in stoppage time to rescue a 1–1 draw, though Houston took the shootout. The sides met again at Houston in July with first place on the line, and on September 4 Austin settled the season series their way: a 2–0 win on the road in Houston. Texas belongs to FCito this year.
2. North Texas SC — the other Texas war. FC Dallas’s reserve side is Austin’s second in-state enemy, and 2026 was a sweep. An early-season 1–0 home win on Djakaria Barro’s goal, then a 2–0 away win with goals from Alastuey and Micah Burton. Two meetings, two clean sheets, zero arguments about who runs the state’s reserve scene.
3. Portland Timbers2 — the chasing pack’s spearhead. Not a named derby, but the rivalry that defined the West all season. Portland finished 2nd in the conference on 57 points and were one of only three teams to beat Austin all year — a 2–1 win on August 30. St. Louis CITY2 and Ventura County FC round out the heavyweight tier, but Portland are the side FCito measured themselves against from March to Decision Day — and the side they may well have to beat again to reach the Cup.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does Austin FC II play?
Parmer Field at St. David’s Performance Center in Austin, Texas — Austin FC’s training complex and one of the most intimate grounds in MLS NEXT Pro. As the No. 1 overall seed, Austin FC II hosts all of its 2026 playoff matches there, starting with the Western Conference Semifinal against LAFC2 on Sunday, October 25, 2026 (7:30 p.m. CT).
Who is Austin FC II’s best player?
Midfielder Jorge Alastuey (No. 10). The Spaniard led the team in scoring two years running (10 goals in 2025, 9 in 2026), made the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Best XI, and earned a first-team Austin FC contract on July 31, 2026. The defensive star is Jules Bery (No. 5), the league’s 2026 Defender of the Year, and the breakout scorer is rookie forward Stefan Dobrijevic (No. 21) with 7 league goals.
What trophies has Austin FC II won?
Four trophies already: the MLS NEXT Pro Cup in 2023 — won in the club’s inaugural season, beating Columbus Crew 2 3–1 in the final — the 2023 Western Conference playoff title, the 2024 MLS NEXT Pro Invitational, and the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro regular-season championship, the league’s best record (65 points) under Coach of the Year Jason Shackell.
How can I get tickets or watch Austin FC II?
Tickets are sold through the club at austinfc.com. Every MLS NEXT Pro match streams live on MLSNEXTPro.com and OneFootball — including all 2026 playoff matches and MLS NEXT Pro Cup on November 6–8, 2026.
⚽ Austin FC II Fan Shop
The full FCito trio — Alastuey, Abarca and Dobrijevic in black and verde.
Sources & official links: Austin FC official site · MLS NEXT Pro official site · Austin FC II semifinal announcement
Black shirts, verde hearts, one more cup to bring home — vamos, FCito.
