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Monday marked Contract Deadline Day in Major League Soccer, meaning that all clubs (apart from the four still participating in the MLS Cup playoffs) had to announce which player contract options they’d picked up and which players they’d effectively cut. 

The 2017 NCAA Men’s College Cup field has been whittled to eight with many of the usual suspects advancing to the quarterfinals. The marquee matchup of the quarters will be a rematch of last year’s College Cup final — Wake Forest, the top-seed, will take on back-to-back national champion Stanford. Seeds 2 through 5 remain alive as well: Indiana, North Carolina, Louisville and Akron. 

You could forgive Stefan Frei for suffering from a professional hangover following his heroics in the 2016 MLS Cup final. The 31-year-old native of Switzerland's legend is forever woven inside the fabric of the league following that save on Jozy Altidore in the second half of extra-time, one of seven saves for Frei in a performance that saw him named MLS Cup MVP. 

Sports stars just get all the luck, don’t they? First the UCLA basketball players get bailed out of a Chinese jail after shoplifting, not Romelu Lukaku is avoiding jail time in another foreign country: the United States.

The Belgian striker will pay a $450 fine to avoid potentially six months in jail stemming from a series of noise complaints while staying in Beverly Hills over the summer. 

A capacity crowd of 21,211 at MAPFRE Stadium provided an electric atmosphere for Tuesday night’s MLS Cup Eastern Conference Final between the Columbus Crew and Toronto FC, but a deserved breakthrough for the Crew — who dominated the second half and landed three shots on target as opposed to zero for the visitors — never arrived.

We’re entering the second week of FIFA corruption trials for three men in New York City and already the court cases are providing more entertainment than an HBO series. The FIFA scandal keeps getting weirder, and that’s not really a good thing for fans of the game, but it’s great for fans of an interesting narrative. 

AND THEN THERE WERE FOUR. Forgive me, but it’s been 15 days since the Conference Semifinals of the 2017 MLS Cup Playoffs wrapped up and I’m just trying to bring the edge back. Tuesday, Nov. 21, sees the first legs of both the Eastern and Western Conference finals kick off in Columbus and Houston, respectively, and we’re here to offer a quick take on what to lookout for in both matches. 

MLS Playoffs: Eastern Conference Final

Columbus Crew SC vs. Toronto FC

MAPFRE Stadium | Columbus, Ohio

November 21, 8 p.m. ET | ESPN