Watch PSL mayor announce professional soccer teams and stadium
The stadium is to be built on a 6-acre site at the Walton & One development.
- Port St. Lucie Sports Club is expected to play in the United Soccer League for its spring 2027 season.
- The club’s stadium is set to anchor Walton & One, a proposed mixed-use development.
- The Walton & One redevelopment area spans 46 acres near MidFlorida Credit Union Event Center.
PORT ST. LUCIE — Professional soccer is coming to the Treasure Coast.
The United Soccer League announced Oct. 13 a new professional soccer team for Port St. Lucie and a new, 6,000-seat stadium.
The men’s team — Port St. Lucie Sports Club — would compete in USL League One and is expected to begin play in spring 2027, with a women’s team to follow.
The team’s symbol is an anchor.
The club is owned by a founding group that includes Gustavo Suárez, Paulo Suárez and Agostina Galimberti, along with a newly formed investment group.
“This is a truly huge day for our city,” said City Councilmember Anthony Bonna. “I can’t wait to take my son and daughters to games. For too long, we were an example of what not to do, and today I can gladly say we are a shinning city in the state of Florida.”
The stadium is to be built on 6 acres at the Walton & One development at Walton Road and U.S. 1 — formerly the City Center — which already is home to MidFlorida Credit Union Event Center.
Port St. Lucie’s only other professional sports stadium, Clover Park, home of the St. Lucie Mets and spring training home of the New York Mets, seats 7,160.
Ebenezer Stadium LLC will build and pay for the stadium. Port St. Lucie’s Community Redevelopment Agency will reimburse Ebenezer up to half the stadium’s $55 million cost.
No city general-fund money will be used for the project, officials said.
About United Soccer League
The USL currently operates three men’s soccer leagues. The USL Championship sits below Major League Soccer on the second tier of the nation’s soccer pyramid. Below that is USL League One, followed by USL League Two.
Earlier this year, USL announced plans to launch a new league, called “Division 1,” which would compete directly with MLS for the nation’s top-tier league, pending approval from the United States Soccer Federation.
Also earlier this year, USL club owners approved a proposal to move towards a promotion-and-relegation system for its three, and eventually four, leagues.
Promotion and relegation — a system by which teams at the bottom of the standings each year drop to the lower league and are replaced by the top teams from that lower league — has long been a staple in soccer federations around the world, but has never caught on in the U.S., often facing pushback from MLS team owners and others inside leadership at the United States Soccer Federation.
The USL also operates two women’s leagues — the Super League and W League. The Super League, which began play in 2024, competes directly with the longer-established National Women’s Soccer League, at the top tier of the nation’s women’s soccer pyramid.
Port St. Lucie Sports Club awarded United Soccer League franchise
Florida’s newest professional soccer club will call the Treasure Coast home.
The City Center story
For much of its history, the Walton & One project was known by a different name: City Center.
In 2001, the city announced an economic-development plan to replace the aging Village Green shopping center with a town center, and by 2005 the city had entered into a public-private partnership with developer George de Guardiola.
Plans included more than 1,000 residential units, along with retail and office space served by four parking garages. A 100,000-square-foot building for events was built, along with the village square, an outdoor stage and one parking garage, before the Great Recession stalled the rest of the project.
De Guardiola defaulted on the loans he had taken out for the project in 2009, and eventually sold the City Center to U.S. Investment LLC, run by Chinese national Lily Zhong, for $500,000. In 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged Zhong with defrauding investors, and seized City Center.
Then, in 2022, the city paid $450,000 to buy 21 acres from the SEC receivership that controlled it. Since then, the city has been leading its redevelopment plans, including the rebrand to Walton & One.
What’s next?
The overall Walton & One redevelopment area covers 46 acres. The city’s plans for the area include creating “a vibrant, walkable destination consisting of retail, restaurant and residential uses,” according to the website.
An artist’s rendering shows two 11-story towers next to the stadium, separated by a pedestrian corridor. City officials said the rendering is conceptual only.
There is no estimated timeline or estimated cost of the total mixed-use development that would surround the stadium.
City leaders have brushed aside claims that they aim to create a traditional “downtown” for a city that lacks one, and instead have said the project aims to bring more recreational opportunities to residents of the eastern half of the city, after areas in the western half such as Tradition, Riverland, Southern Grove and St. Lucie West have seen a number of new developments in recent years.
Jack Randall is TCPalm’s economy and real estate reporter. You can reach him at jack.randall@tcpalm.com.
Wicker Perlis is TCPalm’s Watchdog Reporter for St. Lucie County. You can reach him at wicker.perlis@tcpalm.com.
