It Was the Summer of a Lifetime for Maxime Crepeau—Decades in the Making

Orlando City’s star goalkeeper made history on the world’s grandest stage this summer.

The best is yet to come for Maxime Crépeau. | Rich Storry/Getty Images

There aren’t many players, if any, that know Major League Soccer better than Maxime Crépeau.

The 32-year-old goalkeeper has spent his entire career—more than a decade—in North America, bouncing from team to team all over the league.

“The league is growing very fast,” the Orlando City shot-stopper tells Sports Illustrated. “... Better players are emerging. There’s more football. In terms of watching the games, there’s more quality on the field.”

“You can tell that the people in the country are watching the sport,” he adds. “It’s growing on the field and off the field as well. The MLS of 13 years ago is another story to the MLS today. It’s fantastic to see the progression in the past decade.”

MLS has grown immensely during Crépeau’s time, and the shot-stopper has grown right along with it, fostering a journey that has culminated in the greatest period of his entire career: the summer of 2026.

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The Early Days of MLS and Crépeau

Crépeau made his debut with Montreal in 2017. | Steve Russell/Toronto Star/Getty Images

Crépeau got his start in Montréal, present from the very beginning of the city’s MLS era. He joined the brand-new youth academy of what was then known as Montréal Impact in 2010, just as the franchise won its bid to become the latest member of the U.S.’s top flight.

“Born and raised in Montréal, growing up in the system of the academy, it was an exciting thing around the city to have your own team into the first division,” Crépeau recalls.

Crépeau was a young teenager at the time, just trying to absorb everything he could from a brand-new MLS team captained by soccer legend Davy Arnaud and led by now-Canada manager Jesse Marsch.

“Training with the first team, at 15, and playing with the academy, it was very important because you you could tell what aspects that you needed to work on, the discipline on and off the field,” Crépeau says. “It gave me the repetitions and the trust to allow myself to make mistakes, to learn from them as well, whether it’s training or a game.”

Three years later, he became the youngest player to join Montréal’s senior team, inking a Homegrown contract in 2013. He wouldn’t make his first-team debut until 2017, though, struggling to break out of his third-string position. In the interim, he trained harder and improved his skills by competing with FC Montreal, the senior club’s affiliate USL side, and with the Impact U-23 team.

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Crépeau on the MLS Move, Again and Again

Crépeau is a two-time winner of Whitecaps Player of the Year. | Devin Manky/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images

Although Crépeau was eventually promoted to Montréal’s backup goalkeeper, he still craved more reps, choosing to take a step down professionally and go on loan with the USL’s Ottawa Fury for the 2018 season.

That stepping stone proved integral to Crépeau’s growth. He was voted the league’s goalkeeper of the year after setting a single-season record for shutouts (15). His success earned him the attentions of the Vancouver Whitecaps and paved a distinct path to an MLS starting role. He signed with the Whitecaps ahead of the 2019 season, remaining there until 2022, and he was named Whitecaps Player of the Year twice in that span (2019, 2021).

Crépeau was then traded to LAFC in January 2022 and served as the California side’s stalwart between the posts en route to MLS Cup victory, his first time hoisting the league’s coveted trophy. It wasn’t all glorious, though, as Crépeau devastatingly suffered a broken leg in extra time of that title match while attempting to defend a breakaway. It meant Crépeau missed much of the following year.

He regained full fitness through a five-game stint with LAFC’s reserve side, which competes in MLS NEXT Pro—another stepping stone he deemed imperative to his overall journey. Once fully healthy again, he signed with the Portland Timbers in January 2024.

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Crépeau Earns First MLS All-Star Nod

Crépeau shined at the 2026 MLS All-Star game in Charlotte. | Cory Knowlton/ISI Photos/Getty Images

Crépeau lost out on his starting position at Portland in 2025 and subsequently saw his contract expire. He signed with Orlando City as a free agent ahead of the 2026 season, meaning he was yet again put on the move.

“It shapes your personality and your career, what you have to go through sometimes in adversity,” Crépeau says. “If it doesn’t work out in one spot, you’ll try to find a second wind, find a solution for yourself.”

“You adapt a little bit to everything that gets thrown at you sometimes,” he adds.

He immediately became the Lions’ primary starter between the sticks and made a whopping 62 saves in the first 14 league matches en route to a career-first nod to the 2026 MLS All-Star game this summer. He was just one of three MLS goalkeepers selected, alongside Matt Freese and Brian Schwake.

In the July 29 clash against the Liga MX All-Stars, Crépeau made six saves in less than a half hour, securing a 4–3 victory for the MLS players, all while stunning the crowd in Charlotte and putting himself in serious contention for MVP of the match.

That cross-country trek to sunny Florida had proved integral to Crépeau’s career, as did every one of his pit stops around MLS along the way.

“Moving in the league for the past six or seven years made me adapt, football-wise and city-wise. People only see the field, but there is a life outside the field as well,” Crépeau says.

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Crépeau’s Record-Breaking World Cup Summer

Crépeau was full of emotions upon advancing to the round of 16. | Robin Alam/ISI Photos/ISI Photos/Getty Images

That winding and often-arduous journey through MLS also led him to soccer’s grandest stage: the World Cup.

But first, it brought heartbreak. Crépeau’s broken leg in the 2022 MLS Cup caused him to miss Canada’s trip to the Qatar World Cup less than a month later. Although it was devastating, it ultimately lit a fire in him to be there when his country, alongside the U.S. and Mexico, co-hosted the tournament four years later.

“It was a big blow,” Crépeau says. “We won the MLS Cup and had a fantastic year, [I was] so happy, but the big blow was to miss the 2022 World Cup and the rehab after that one. It took me about nine to 10 months to feel good. I lost about a year.”

He adds: “I honestly told myself that the next one—the one that we just lived—was non-negotiable for me to be there. It was almost a promise to myself. I said, ‘2026 is mine.’”

Crépeau’s broken leg sidelined him for the 2022 World Cup. | Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

It sure was, as Crépeau somewhat-unexpectedly won out the fierce competition with 2025 MLS Goalkeeper of the Year and fellow Canadian, Dayne St. Clair, for Canada’s starting job and led the Canucks on a wildly historic tournament ride.

Crépeau started all five of Canada’s World Cup matches, playing a key part in the nation’s first-ever tournament victory, an emphatic 6–0 win against Qatar in Group B play. That result also signified Canada’s first-ever World Cup clean sheet, a nice feather for Crépeau’s cap. He then led Canada into its first-ever knockout stage, as the country finished second in the group behind Switzerland to automatically advance.

The Canucks then made history with their first World Cup knockout stage win, defeating South Africa 1–0 in the round of 32, another clean-sheet performance from Crépeau. He manned the posts in the nation’s round of 16 appearance, and although it was an eventual 3–0 loss to African powerhouse Morocco, it didn’t taint the magic of the summer and the incredible progress Canada made as a soccer nation.

“Winning the first game, knockout game and having a clean sheet, for instance, there’s plenty of little boxes that we were able to check, so [I’m] very proud of it,” Crépeau says.

“It was a beautiful thing to see the country moving with us,” Crépeau adds. “It was the first time that I [saw] the streets full, a sea of red everywhere. You’ve got flares going off. You’ve got walks to the stadium.

“It’s the first time you really felt the country united ... It’s something that will stay with me for a long time.”

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Crépeau, MLS Growing Together

Crépeau played five games in MLS NEXT Pro in 2023. | Bill Barrett/ISI Photos/Getty Images

Crépeau’s growth over the past 13 years wouldn’t have been possible without the growth of the league that has fostered every stage of his career.

“Everything is trending the right way,” he says of MLS, especially post-World Cup.

The most exciting aspect of the league’s growth for Crépeau is the throngs of young players following in his footsteps, coming up through the ranks of the relatively new MLS NEXT program.

“MLS NEXT is a fantastic tool for every player that wants to work on their craft and to allow themselves to be dreaming about a career in the game,” Crépeau says of the youth pipeline founded in 2020. “You see so many MLS NEXT players evolving and then signing their deal with the first team and then having a breakout.

“It allows them to have a platform to perform and to develop into the players they are today. Honestly, there’s no way around it. It’s mandatory to have a team like that. For the kids in the city, it’s unbelievable.”

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