Published for Orlando City B fans — October 2026
By Toxlay Sports Editorial Team · Last updated October 23, 2026
⚽ Orlando City B Fans — Your Young Lions Are Coming!
The youngest team in club history came within one place of the playoffs, launched a U.S. international, and sold a striker overseas — all in one season. Purple shirts, full voice — this is the year to wear the Young Lions’ colors.
The Club
Orlando City B — OCB to everyone around Kissimmee — is the reserve team of MLS club Orlando City SC. The second team was announced on June 30, 2015, the branding was unveiled that October, and the Young Lions played their first season in 2016. The path since then tells the story of American soccer’s lower leagues: USL, a founding place in USL League One, and then a founding place in MLS NEXT Pro, where the club has played since the league launched in 2022, in the Eastern Conference’s Southeast Division. Home is Osceola County Stadium in Kissimmee, Florida, at Osceola Heritage Park — the club’s training complex, where the first team trains and the next generation grows up in its shadow.
The identity is borrowed proudly from the parent club: purple and gold, the lion on the crest, and a nickname — the Young Lions — that in 2026 stopped being a cute label and became a literal description of the squad. This is a development side and it does not pretend otherwise. Orlando City B has never won a league trophy; its best MLS NEXT Pro runs are the playoff trips of 2023 (a conference semifinal) and 2024 (a conference quarterfinal). What this club produces is not silverware. It produces players — and in 2026 it produced them at a rate the whole league had to notice.
The dugout was a revolving door that somehow never knocked the team off stride. Manuel Goldberg, the head coach, was promoted onto the first team’s MLS coaching staff as the season began; assistant Julian Vergara bridged the gap as interim from March 10; and on April 9, 2026, academy coach Edward “Eddie” Wilding stepped up and led the group the rest of the way. Three head coaches in five weeks would sink most teams. This one just kept handing debuts to teenagers.
And then there is the shirt. Ask anyone searching for the Orlando City B jersey in 2026 and they will describe the same thing: an adidas purple shirt crossed by a darker tonal wavy-stripe “storm” pattern — the first team’s Perfect Storm design — with a gold crew collar, a gold side panel under each arm, three white adidas stripes over the shoulders, the lion crest on the left chest, and the sponsor ORLANDO HEALTH stacked in white across the middle. It is one of the most recognizable looks in MLS NEXT Pro — and this season it was worn by the youngest squad the club has ever fielded.
⭐ FAN FAVORITE
#23 Sarajian — Orlando City B Style Jersey
$59.99
The SuperDraft star in purple — tonal storm stripes, gold collar, the white ORLANDO HEALTH and 23 on the back. Fan-inspired apparel made for Young Lions fans.
Last Season (2025): The Step Back
On the table, 2025 was the year the Young Lions went backwards. Orlando City B finished 12th in the Eastern Conference — 22nd overall — with 9 wins, 6 draws and 13 losses, 38 goals scored and 55 conceded for 37 points. They missed the playoffs for the first time in the club’s MLS NEXT Pro era, a sharp comedown after the postseason trips of 2023 and 2024, in what proved to be head coach Manuel Goldberg’s one full season in charge.
But the pipeline underneath the results was already rumbling. Justin Ellis announced himself in 2025: a Player of the Matchweek 10 honor after three goal contributions in a 3–0 win over Inter Miami CF II on May 17, an MLS NEXT U-19 Golden Boot with 18 goals, U-19 MVP honors, and the top-scorer finish at the Generation adidas Cup. The first team was watching. Everybody was watching. The step-back season, it turned out, was just the runway for the full youth wave that defined 2026.
Best Players Right Now
Harvey Sarajian — #23, midfielder. The standout performer of 2026, full stop. The No. 5 overall pick in the 2026 MLS SuperDraft produced a team-high 13 goal contributions (7 goals, 6 assists), posted the squad’s best FotMob rating at 7.69, and his very first OCB assist set up the club’s first goal of the season. Then he carried the form upstairs — 2 goals and 2 assists for the First Team in MLS. The draft pick became the heartbeat.
Justin Ellis — #22, forward. The biggest name the pathway has produced. The Homegrown signing from Wellington, Florida, was named the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Pathway Player of the Year on October 15 — and by then he had already earned a first senior U.S. Men’s National Team call-up, scoring twice in three international matches. His MLS line in 2026: 11 goal contributions in 20 appearances. His OCB cameo was short and decisive — 3 goals and 2 assists in four starts, including the winner in the season’s first victory.
Issah Haruna — #38, midfielder. The engine. Seven goals and 6 assists in 2026, described by the club as one of the most influential players on the roster and a constant presence in the middle of the park. Drafted 20th overall in the 2026 MLS SuperDraft, Haruna was handed a First Team debut during Leagues Cup — the season’s quiet constant, and the midfielder everything in Kissimmee ran through.
Gustavo Caraballo — #65, midfielder. Seven goals and 5 assists, with the kind of finishing streak that bends seasons: his strike against Toronto FC II on September 13 was his seventh of the year and capped a three-match scoring run that powered the Young Lions’ late, lonely charge at the playoff line.
Ignacio Gómez — #80, midfielder. The Argentine loanee from Vélez Sarsfield brought a senior pedigree to a teenage midfield, scoring 4 OCB goals by mid-September — and he scored for the First Team too, in its 4–1 MLS win over Charlotte FC in April. When the Young Lions needed a grown-up moment, Gómez usually provided it.
Parker Amoo-Mensah — #52, defender. The back line’s success story: a strong first professional season in purple, rewarded with a recent U.S. U-19 Youth National Team call-up. On a team that shipped 56 goals, Amoo-Mensah was the defender whose stock rose every single month.
Star Spotlight
From the fifth pick to the heartbeat. Draft night is a promise; Harvey Sarajian kept it in full. On September 13, 2026, against Toronto FC II, he delivered the complete performance in a single night — an assist for Caraballo’s goal on 43 minutes, then a goal of his own on 58 — in a 3–1 home win. Team-high 13 goal contributions, the squad’s best rating, and a genuine First Team foothold by autumn: the No. 23 is the face of this team now.
October 15, 2026 — the pathway crowns its own. MLS NEXT Pro named Justin Ellis its 2026 Pathway Player of the Year — just the second winner of the award — for the young player who best used the league as a launchpad. Read the résumé the league cited and it reads like a fairy tale: Homegrown contract signed ahead of 2026, first MLS goal on April 25 against D.C. United, 11 MLS goal contributions, a senior USMNT call-up with two goals in three matches — all of it built on the 18-goal U-19 Golden Boot season of 2025. Kissimmee made an international this year.
September 4, 2026 — the rout in Fort Lauderdale. The signature result of the Wilding era, singled out by the club itself: Orlando City B 4, Inter Miami CF II 1, away from home, against the in-state rival. A team of teenagers — the youngest in club history — went to the rival’s ground and won by three. If one night explains what this club is for, it is that one.
🔥 More Fan Favorites
More Young Lions stars, same purple and gold.
This Season (2026): The Youngest Lions Ever
The numbers first, because the ending was cruel. Orlando City B finished 10th in the Eastern Conference (5th in the Southeast Division, 16th overall): 28 played, 11 regulation wins, 4 shootout wins, 3 shootout losses and 10 defeats, 55 goals scored and 56 conceded, for 44 points. For 2026 the top nine clubs in each conference reached the playoffs, with the new Play-In round matching No. 8 against No. 9 — and Orlando finished one place below that line, level on points with ninth-place Huntsville City FC but behind on the regulation-wins tiebreaker, 11 to 12. One more win, anywhere, and this team was playing October football.
And yet nobody in Kissimmee calls it a failure, because of who did it. This was the youngest Orlando City B team the club has ever fielded — one of the youngest in the league — and a club-record 15 non-signed Academy players made their professional debuts. Sixteen-year-old academy forward Matthew Belgodere scored 5 goals and twice earned MLS NEXT Rising Star of the Matchweek honors; sixteen-year-old Caleb Trombino started the MLS NEXT All-Star Game and scored his first pro goal in March. The nursery was not a slogan. It was the lineup.
The exports tell the rest of the story. Top scorer Pedro Leão — signed from Flamengo’s U-20 side in January after 20 goals and a U-20 Intercontinental Cup there — scored 8 goals in purple, then was sold to Hatta FC of the UAE Pro League on September 28, with Orlando retaining a sell-on percentage. Ellis and midfielder Bernardo Rhein earned First Team contracts. Goalkeeper Tristan Himes signed a Homegrown deal and is now the First Team’s third goalkeeper. Academy midfielder Dylan Judelson was loaned to Serie A side Genoa. One season, five different doors out of Kissimmee — every one of them the door this club exists to open.
The run-in gave the year its final twist. The Young Lions beat the East’s No. 1 seed Crown Legacy FC 3–2 on August 30 (Haruna, Belgodere and Caraballo scoring) to finish that season series unbeaten, routed Inter Miami CF II 4–1 away, and beat Toronto FC II 3–1 — three straight wins that dragged them to the edge of the line. Then Decision Day, September 20: a 2–4 home defeat to Atlanta United 2, and the season was over by a tiebreaker. They will be back older, deeper, and — on this evidence — very hard to keep out of the playoffs in 2027.
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Mark Your Calendar
Orlando City B’s season is over — no more Young Lions fixtures in 2026 — but the MLS NEXT Pro Playoffs roll on without them, and every match streams live on OneFootball.com and MLSNEXTPro.com. Here is the road to the Cup:
Sunday, October 25, 2026 — Conference Semifinals. The final four in each conference: Chattanooga FC vs. CT United FC (5 p.m. ET) and Crown Legacy FC vs. Columbus Crew 2 (7 p.m. ET) in the East; Austin FC II vs. LAFC 2 (8:30 p.m. ET) and Portland Timbers2 vs. Ventura County FC (10 p.m. ET) in the West.
October 30 – November 1, 2026 — Conference Finals. One match in each conference, hosted by the higher remaining seed, to decide who plays for the Cup.
November 6–8, 2026 — MLS NEXT Pro Cup. The championship match, hosted by the finalist with the highest regular-season points total. Orlando’s season ended a tiebreaker short of this tournament — the whole winter’s motivation, gift-wrapped.
Biggest Rivalries — The Wars
1. Inter Miami CF II — the Florida rivalry. The club calls them the in-state rival, and 2026 delivered the edition Orlando fans will retell for years: a 4–1 win away in Fort Lauderdale on September 4, the statement result of the Wilding era. The grudge runs deeper than one night — Ellis’s 2025 breakout was built on a 3–0 win over the same opponent. Two Florida academies, one turnpike, zero friendliness.
2. Atlanta United 2 — the Southeast measuring stick. Orlando’s own match reports bill them as a rival, and the 2026 trilogy swung like a pendulum: a 2–0 Orlando win on May 11, a 5–1 Atlanta rout on August 22, and then Decision Day — Atlanta back in Kissimmee on September 20, winning 4–2 to seal third place and end the Young Lions’ playoff hopes on their own field. That one has to be answered in 2027.
3. Crown Legacy FC and Chattanooga FC — the Southeast summit. The division’s two heavyweights set Orlando’s ceiling this year — and the Young Lions bloodied both. A 3–2 win over Crown Legacy, the East’s No. 1 seed, on August 30 left Orlando unbeaten across the three-match season series. And in the spring, a comeback from 2–1 down to beat Chattanooga FC on May 31 launched a four-match win streak built on late rallies — this team’s signature move all season long.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does Orlando City B play?
Osceola County Stadium in Kissimmee, Florida — at Osceola Heritage Park, the Orlando City training complex. It has been the Young Lions’ home throughout the club’s MLS NEXT Pro era, and home match tickets are sold through the club at orlandocitysc.com.
Did Orlando City B make the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro playoffs?
No — by the narrowest margin in the league. Orlando City B finished 10th in the Eastern Conference on 44 points, one place below the new Play-In line: level on points with ninth-place Huntsville City FC, but behind on the regulation-wins tiebreaker, 11 to 12. The season ended on Decision Day, September 20, 2026.
Who is Orlando City B’s best player?
On 2026 production it is midfielder Harvey Sarajian (No. 23) — a team-high 13 goal contributions (7 goals, 6 assists) and the squad’s best FotMob rating after arriving as the No. 5 pick in the 2026 MLS SuperDraft. The biggest name is forward Justin Ellis (No. 22), the 2026 MLS NEXT Pro Pathway Player of the Year, who earned a senior U.S. national team call-up and scored twice in three international matches.
How can I watch Orlando City B?
MLS NEXT Pro matches stream live on MLSNEXTPro.com and OneFootball, including every 2026 playoff match and MLS NEXT Pro Cup on November 6–8, 2026. Orlando City B’s own season is over — they missed the playoffs by one place — but the Young Lions return in 2027, with home matches at Osceola County Stadium in Kissimmee.
⚽ Orlando City B Fan Shop
The full Young Lions trio — Sarajian, Ellis and Haruna in purple and gold.
Sources & official links: Orlando City official site · MLS NEXT Pro official site · Orlando City B 2026 season recap
Purple shirts, full voice, the next wave is already here — come on you Young Lions.
