San Antonio FC Punches Ticket To Playoffs With Win Over El Paso In Home Finale

SAN ANTONIO – For weeks, San Antonio FC looked like a team pressing their face against a glass door, knocking and hoping to find a way through. On Saturday night, the door finally burst open.

A 5–2 win over El Paso Locomotive at Toyota Field secured SAFC’s postseason return and restored a vital ingredient this group had been missing: urgency. After a brutal drought of more than 480 minutes without a goal, San Antonio suddenly poured in five with a mix of passion and set-pieces that felt unfamiliar in the best possible way.

“We’re happy. You know, it’s been a long season with a lot of ups and downs, and I think the guys deserve to be in the playoffs and to have a chance to compete for the cup, and now, you just take one game at a time,” SAFC Head Coach Carlos Llamosa said.

The timing could not be more important. The pressure of a playoff berth had been hovering over everything SAFC touched. With the fan base anxious, rivals in town, and the margin for error narrow, Saturday’s performance offered a real statement.

San Antonio isn’t done yet.

Here are three takeaways from the match:

A fueled response

El Paso scored the first goal of the game just seven minutes into the match. For a club that has been struggling to manufacture offense, that could have shattered what confidence they had.

Instead, it ignited them.

Two minutes later, Santiago Patiño caught the end of a ball from team captain Mitch Taintor, cushioning the ball off his chest before smashing a volley past the Locomotive keeper, tying the game 1-1.

From that moment forward, SAFC played like a team hell-bent on rewriting its story.

“Well, the guys knew that they have the character tonight. They knew that winning means we make playoffs no matter what, other results in other venues, so that was our goal,” Llamosa said.

Mentality Monsters 2.0

Five goals will ease some of the pressure, yet the defensive side wasn’t perfect.

El Paso found space in transition more than once, and there were moments where pressure dipped and concentration lagged. 

The back line answered when they needed to. After weeks of situations with zero attacking reward, giving up the first goal could have spelled disaster.

Instead, San Antonio fought back with confidence.

“It gives us a lot of confidence, because in those four or five games we created chances… so when we’re determined, when we’re pushing, when we don’t give up, we can create the chances and we can score balls,” Llamosa said. “The guys are confident that we can score goals one way or another.”

Momentum, restored

There’s still defending to clean up, and the road to a second championship will not be easy.

Yet this victory tells us something important: San Antonio can win games on more than just grit. They can open their stride. They can dictate, not just disrupt.

Weeks of frustration made this eruption feel like it was needed. If the spark seen Saturday becomes a steady burn, nobody in the Western Conference will enjoy drawing SAFC in a knockout match.

For the first time in a long time, the club isn’t just searching for confidence.

It feels like they’ve found it.

“When playoffs start, it doesn’t matter if you’re first or eighth. It’s one game, face-to-face, and you got to take it, and this was a playoff atmosphere here, so it was a good prep going into playoffs,” SAFC Defender Nelson Flores Blanco said. “This was a huge match for us.”

Up next:

San Antonio FC will now face New Mexico United in the first round of the USL Playoffs next weekend, November 1, at 8 p.m. CT.