After its most disappointing MLS playoff exit yet, Nashville SC is at a crossroads | Estes

To those who tuned in for “The Night That Lionel Messi Was Here” in August and tuned out soon afterward: You didn’t miss much.

Technically, Nashville SC’s 2023 season didn’t end the night that Messi’s Miami team visited GEODIS Park and won an enthralling final of the Leagues Cup. That was only a side tournament.

The real championship of Major League Soccer is being decided now in the league’s postseason playoffs. And Nashville SC, as of Tuesday night, is no longer a participant.

Orlando City’s 1-0 victory at GEODIS Park completed a two-game sweep, knocking listless Nashville out in its opening round of the MLS Cup playoffs for the second year in a row. While Nashville has made the playoffs in all four seasons of its MLS existence, it has again failed to advance past the quarterfinals.

This latest exit was its most disappointing yet. That’s not just because of how poorly it ended. It’s also because of how the season began. Preseason projections called for Nashville in 2023 to rank among the best teams in MLS. That stirring Leagues Cup run showed why.

Otherwise, though, this club underachieved.

It finished seventh in the Eastern Conference, crawling into the playoffs in poor form. That continued with two predictable 1-0 defeats to Orlando in which Nashville – as was too often the case in recent weeks – couldn’t muster enough offense despite the presence of last season’s MLS MVP Hany Mukhtar and the midseason addition of English striker Sam Surridge.

Early in Game 1 in Orlando, Surridge flubbed a point-blank chance in front of goal. It was a bad miss, setting the tone for the best-of-three series. In Tuesday's Game 2, Orlando scored in the game’s sixth minute and then held on with Nashville totaling a meager four shots on goal.

"We will all be bitterly disappointed when we wake up in the morning that we've (been) bounced out of the playoffs in such a fashion,” Nashville coach Gary Smith said. “We are better than that. I know we are. The guys know they are. I don't think they've given the fans or anyone else a true reflection of what we're capable of here tonight -- or in the two games. I think that will sit heavy going into the offseason."

Wasn't just the two playoff games.

Nashville failed to score in six of its final seven contests.

It only won two of 12 MLS games since the Leagues Cup final.

Smith’s press conferences typically have some of the more refreshingly candid conversations you’ll find in our city’s sports landscape. Tuesday’s was no different as Smith summed up such a dismal end to a promising season.

“We’ve shown that there’s definitely quality and the ability to challenge in a far better way than we have done this year in the postseason,” Smith said, “no two ways about it.”

Smith said that top defenseman Walker Zimmerman has been playing through an Achilles injury for much of the season.

On Mukhtar, who failed to score in the season’s final eight games, Smith noted that his star "has not been anywhere near as effective. I don't know the reason for that.” He suggested it could have gone back to when Mukhtar was pursued in July by a team from Qatar, which was an interesting observation for a player who has been said to be seeking a new contract from Nashville.

Smith, too, was asked if he thought he’d lost the locker room late in the season and whether he thought he’d be back as coach in 2024.

“I see no reason why I wouldn’t be,” he replied. “There have been some real highs in this season. We would all love to have finished this season off in a very different manner to the way that we have.”

And now, as much as any time in its brief history, Nashville finds itself at a crossroads this offseason. There are important questions ahead. The club must figure out how to improve an aging roster that might be creeping past its prime.

With an average age of 29, Nashville had the oldest roster in MLS this season, according to the website Transfermarkt. On Tuesday night, the 11 players in Nashville’s starting lineup averaged 30.4 years of age. Orlando’s lineup? 26.5.

Did an older Nashville team wear down at the finish line this season? Many of Nashville’s key players are over 30. Stalwarts like goalkeeper Joe Willis (35), midfielders Dax McCarty (36) and Anibal Godoy (33), forward Fafa Picault (32) and defenders Daniel Lovitz (32) and Zimmerman (30). Mukhtar is 28. Surridge was Nashville’s only starter Tuesday younger than 27.

Those numbers aren’t encouraging for the club's future.

The offensive production on the field since Aug. 19 hasn't been encouraging, either, for the present.

As Smith said appropriately, “We can now look back and say we peaked in the (Leagues Cup) final.”

Nashville SC can hope that only holds true for this season – and not more to follow.

Reach Tennessean sports columnist Gentry Estes at gestes@tennessean.com and on the X platform (formerly known as Twitter) @Gentry_Estes.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nashville SC at a crossroads after another early MLS playoff exit