League for Clubs announces schedules for Gulf Coast teams

Nine teams divided into two divisions will play 10 matches each beginning May 10.

Pensacola FC midfielder Mikey Lightbourne. Photo: Pensacola FC.

GCPL joins League for Clubs

The Gulf Coast Premier League enters a new era in 2025, partnering with The League for Clubs to ensure its teams have a clear path to national competition and greater player development opportunities.

Nine GCPL clubs, divided into East and West divisions, will compete as TLfC’s Gulf Coast Conference beginning in May. On Friday, TLfC released the conference’s schedule, with matches beginning May 10.

The East Division includes four teams: Pensacola (Fla.) FC, Sowegans SC (Southwest Georgians, Leesburg, Ga.), Tallahassee (Fla.) SC and Valdosta (Ga.) FC.

The five-team West Division is comprised by AFC Mobile (Ala.), Gaffa FC (Jackson, Miss.), Gulf Coast United FC (Gulfport, Miss.), Pensacola (Fla.) FC Academy, and Union 10 FC (Daphne, Ala.)

Each team will play a 10-match regular season, including home and away matches against each division opponent. On July 9, the division winners will host the other division’s second-place team; those winners will play July 12 for the first-ever conference title.

The new conference’s first two matches are scheduled to kick off at 7:15 p.m. ET in Georgia, where Pensacola will play Sowegans in Leesburg and Valdosta FC will host Tallahassee.

An hour later, at 7:15 p.m. CT, Gaffa FC will host Gulf Coast United in Jackson, Miss.

Games to watch

Most of the clubs have been accustomed to playing each other in the GCPL or NPSL for much of the past decade. But, joining a new league brings new opportunities to nurture existing rivalries and cultivate new ones.

The home-and-away matches between AFC Mobile and Union 10 FC are the closest thing the new conference has to a regular derby — they’re less than half an hour apart. The Azaleas host Union 10 on June 7 and travel east to Daphne on June 18.

Gulf Coast United FC (of Gulfport, Miss., west of Mobile) and Pensacola FC Academy (east of the Alabama port city) are close enough to make most West Division matches compelling.

Gaffa FC, in Jackson, Miss. — with every conference team at least three hours away — doesn’t have a natural rival, yet, but a few tense matches can change that.

The East Division clubs are a little further apart than their West counterparts, but they have the potential to create some potent rivalries.

Pensacola FC’s Pelicans and the Battle Lions of Tallahassee FC are three hours apart, but are familiar foes; they play May 25 at Pensacola and June 11 in the Florida capitol.

Tallahassee is closer to the conference’s Georgia teams, Sowegans in Leesburg (a suburb of Albany) and Valdosta FC. The Lions visit Valdosta on opening night (May 10) and host the return match on July 2, during the last week of the regular season.

The Peach State sides, Sowegans and Valdosta, are about 100 miles and 100 minutes apart and will play three times in 2025: May 14 at Valdosta, May 24 in Leesburg, and back in June 11.

For more on The League for Clubs’ Gulf Coast Conference, keep following Southeast Soccer Report, where a team of dedicated soccer fans who write are dedicated to telling the region’s soccer stories, from the bottom up.