Houston made the cut today as one of 11 host cities for the 2026 World Cup. Maybe Rice is involved somehow in the practice areas leading up to matches, but either way, it should be a fun environment for the few matches Houston gets to host in four years.

I'm excited for this! There are 11 US cities, 2 cities in Canada, and 3 in Mexico.

The full list

United States: New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, Boston, Atlanta, Miami, Houston, Dallas, Kansas City, Seattle, San Francisco/Bay Area and Los Angeles/SoFi Stadium

Canada: Vancouver, Toronto

Mexico: Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey

Texas and California get 2 host cities. Interestingly, Chicago is not on the list.

Chicago dropped its bid 4 years ago for financial reasons. The main surprises not making the final cut were DC (probably lost out to Boston), Denver (lost out to KC) and Cincinnati.

This World Cup will have an expanded number of teams competing so even though there are more host cities this time than in 1994 when the US last hosted, one would expect Houston to host around 6-8 matches? Probably various group meetings, and then one knockout round match? Possibly a Round of 16, and maybe even a quarterfinal match?