It’s all in the headline, really. The USL was full of announcements yesterday, dropping the 2018 conference alignment news in the morning, and now this. City will begin its fourth season on St. Patrick’s Day, about a week earlier than usual, against league newcomers Nashville FC. We also know that we’ll be FC Cincinnati’s home opening opponent on April 7, so mark your calendars for that quick road trip.

With respect to Nashville: It’s hardly worth getting excited about a series against a team that will be leaving in two years, but hey, it’s your life. We’re not gonna tell you what to do. The Sour Mash Soccer Bash is pleasing enough to say that it’d be a shame to waste such a fun phrase, for sure. Regardless, it’s Los Morados’s first match at Slugger in what feels like eons, and we can certainly get ginned up about that! Whiskey’d up? Whatever.

What the league’s home opener announcement also effectively does is foreclose the possibility that another NASL team joins the league in 2018. That’s unfortunate, but at some point, but understandable. The league and its teams needed some certainty so it could get the rest of the schedule together. I expect we’ll have a full schedule to obsess by this time next week. Yay!