Nashville wins. And Nashville is cooler today than it was yesterday.

Major League Soccer is expected to announce its plan to grant Nashville an expansion franchise on Wednesday. It will mark the completion of a civic journey that appeared improbable at best just one year ago. It’s the start of another sports odyssey here. And it’s the continuation of growth for a city and league with room to grow.

Big-time soccer seems to fit perfectly here, and now we’re going to get it. Nashville’s MLS team is expected to begin play in 2020.

More:MLS officials headed to Nashville, a strong sign Music City picked for expansion

The league is in major markets, but it’s also in Portland. Salt Lake City. Vancouver. The Columbus, Ohio, team might move to Austin, Texas. There’s a young, hip vibe to the whole thing, and that certainly plays here.

More:MLS in Nashville? How we got here.

Nashville and Buffalo were the only U.S. cities with the major-league combination of NFL and NHL teams, and now Nashville will stand alone with an NFL/NHL/MLS trio. This is a hockey town right now with the 1998-born Predators winning big and creating one of the best atmospheres in any sport, but this city has supported the Tennessee Titans as well since the franchise started playing in Nashville in 1998.

More:Can Nashville support another pro sports team?

We have yet to demonstrate consistent support of a soccer team, which is one of the reasons this bid looked like a long shot when Nashville businessman Bill Hagerty organized an MLS steering committee in August 2016. That demonstration can begin in the spring when Nashville’s United Soccer League team, Nashville SC, debuts with games at First Tennessee Park, home of the Triple-A Sounds baseball team.

But we have demonstrated soccer fever. More than 47,000 people attended Nissan Stadium for a Gold Cup match between the United States and Panama – with MLS Commissioner Don Garber in attendance – in June. As a travel soccer parent, I can say I’m beyond impressed with the talent, coaching and passion for the sport in this area.

Considering our ongoing, rapid growth, this feels like the right time to make this jump. Consider for a moment the fast work that made it possible. When John R. Ingram emerged as the lead investor in December 2016, the idea gained clout. A few weeks later, Mayor Megan Barry announced her idea for an MLS stadium at the fairgrounds. The addition of the Wilf family, owners of the NFL’s Minnesota Vikings, bolstered the movement in August.

More:Why Major League Soccer is picking Nashville for expansion

Metro Council voted 31-6 last month to commit to bond funding for a $275 million stadium, the key to landing an MLS franchise. The ownership group will pay the city $9 million annually to help retire the debt, and the ownership group also gets 10 acres of fairgrounds land for development.

More:MLS in Nashville? How we got here.

Some have protested that exchange, but that’s business. It beats a significant hit to taxpayers, and it’s going to create another Nashville hot spot. It’s going to enhance what I expect to be strong local support for this team from the start.

The league itself still has work to do. The NFL and NHL have the best football and hockey players in the world, respectively, and the same is true of basketball players in the NBA and major league baseball players. That’s not true of MLS, which lags well behind those four leagues in terms of TV ratings. Hard-core soccer fans follow the English Premier League and others, though the MLS has worked hard to get younger and change the perception that it's a haven for aging European stars.

Strengthening the MLS brand and developing talent that can take on the best in the world is the league's ongoing quest. It’s part of this country’s quest of competing at the highest level in the most popular sport in the world. And now we’re part of that, and that’s undeniably cool.

Reach Joe Rexrode at jrexrode@tennessean.com and follow him on Twitter @joerexrode.