by JAKE NUTTING

NASL schedule release day is the first unofficial big event day of the calendar year for NASL supporters. This year the league rewarded the fans with the full schedule on the same day, as opposed to revealing only the considerably shorter Spiring Season like last year.

The league has added three expansion sides to this year’s competition, but has also lost the San Antonio Scorpions and Atlanta Silverbacks this offseason. As a result, the regular season has only increased by two, with 32 regular season matches now deciding who makes it into the four-team postseason.

The league format remains unchanged. The Spring Season and Fall Season winners will claim the top two playoff seeds and home field advantage in the first round, while the two teams directly below them in the combined standings will occupy the bottom two seeds.

Now for the part everyone reading this cares about: the Rowdies.

Tampa Bay doesn’t have much to gripe about with what seems to be an evenly spaced out schedule. The longest the team will be away from Al Lang Stadium is two matches at a time, with three two-game road trips in the fall. They also have four two-game home stands throughout the year. Having occasional back to back home games might enable them to build momentum, which is something they failed to do last year as they faced a string of home and away’s to close out the fall.

The team’s lone bye week of the year will fall on the first weekend of May, directly in the middle of the 10-game Spring Season.

For the second year in a row, the Rowdies won’t be squaring off with their heritage rival Fort Lauderdale Strikers on July 4 weekend. They will, however, host some instate competition on the holiday weekend. Jacksonville Armada FC is set to travel to St. Pete for a July 2 match.

July will be a busy stretch across the entire NASL, and the Rowdies are not immune from that with six fixtures set for that month. However, their busiest time of the year will come in October, which also happens to be the final month of the regular season. The Rowdies will take the field seven times that month, including two home Wednesday matches.

The benefit of the NASL expanding to four teams in Florida is that travel becomes less of a concern for the Rowdies. Eight of Tampa Bay’s ten Spring Season matches will be played in Florida. Unfortunately the Rowdies wont be hosting any of their instate rivals in the spring, but a short bus ride always beats a plane trip to Edmonton.

Here’s when the Rowdies will face off with the NASL’s newcomers: