San Jose Earthquakes 1–1 LA Galaxy: This Season is Just Heating Up
If you look back at the last 15 seasons of the San Jose Earthquakes, barring a few exceptions, the summer showdown between these two rivals effectively marked the end of San Jose’s meaningful matches for the campaign. Under Bruce Arena and led by the attacking trio of Cristian Espinoza, Josef Martinez, and Chicho Arango, that looks to be changing.
In a vacuum, only managing a draw at home against a club far adrift from the playoff spots is a frustrating result. Ignoring LA Galaxy’s status as the defending MLS Cup champions, this season was derailed early for them. However, San Jose Earthquakes managed to get four points from this head to head matchup by virtue of an earlier victory at Dignity Health Sports Park. In this past week alone, San Jose Earthquakes accumulated four points having won in a gutsy performance on the road at FC Dallas.
It looked like the Quakes could get a points haul of the maximum six when Beau Leroux hit a beautiful goal in the first half. The chance creation was there for more as Galaxy goalkeeper Novak Micovic had to prevent his side falling further behind. Likewise, Daniel in San Jose’s net put on a clinic. The only goal he conceded preceded an initial save on Marco Reus, who was able to poke home the rebound. Bruce Arena acknowledged that the visitors grew into the match in the second half, continuing to preach growth and consistency as this club continues to learn how to win. Just as important is salvaging points when you are unable to put a full 90 minutes together.
The results of this metamorphosis San Jose Earthquakes has achieved in 2025 is that they are in the thick of the playoff picture. Granted, their current position in 6th place is unlikely to hold given the 7th place club LAFC has 4 games in hand while only being 1 point behind. But they are 4 points clear of the highest ranked non-playoff team (Houston Dynamo) and their aforementioned win against FC Dallas means even if Dallas wins their game in hand, they’ll still be 3 points behind the Earthquakes.
Instead of the California Clasico at Stanford Stadium being the peak of the season in terms of importance, Earthquakes fans can look forward to a competitive month of July featuring five MLS fixtures with significant playoff implications and a US Open Cup Quarterfinal against Austin FC. That is the type of season that will lure many of the 42,881 in attendance on Saturday to return to PayPal Park for more games this season.
