January was a light month for the academy teams with only one weekend of games where all age groups played a MLS Next Flex match against The Town. The weekend was successful with the U17 and U19 age groups getting the win and the U16 group settling for a draw.
The U17 group in particular continued to showcase a potent offense where they put up 12 goals. That now brings them to 66 goals scored in 16 games played across all competitions.
Other academy news is that there were a handful of players that joined the Sounders first team for preseason in Portugal and Spain. Gallatin Sandnes and Noah Newman have been with the team throughout this trip as reported by Jeremiah, and we also learned that Mo Shour has joined.
Our starting group v. IF Brommapojkarna: Andrew Thomas Kalani Kossa-Rienzi Cody Baker Jackson Ragen Nouhou Hassani Dotson Cristian Roldan Snyder Brunell Albert Rusnák Georgi Minoungou Jordan Morris *Mo Shour has joined the group in Marbella, but is unavailable for this match.
— Sounders FC (@soundersfc.com) 2026-01-31T12:16:59.486Z
Below is a snapshot of each player for those not familiar.
Gallatin Sandnes
- 17-year-old CB who has 13 appearances with Tacoma Defiance. This is his second preseason with the first team as he also joined for the 2024 trip to Marbella.
Noah Newman
- 18-year-old GK who has 4 appearances with Tacoma Defiance, all at the end of last season. He recently committed to the University of Washington
Mohammed Shour
- Another 18-year-old GK who was signed to Tacoma Defiance a year ago and has made 9 appearances. He was named to the MLS Next all star game in 2023 and earned the MVP.
