The Portland Hearts of Pine professional men’s soccer team is fast-approaching selling out its inaugural home season at Fitzpatrick Stadium, according to team president Kevin Schohl. Schohl said 90% of the tickets “for the entire season are either sold or reserved for groups who are in the process of having their group members purchase from their group allotment.” The only season tickets that remain are in the Highroller Field Club area, going for either $2,520 or $2,700. And there aren’t many of those left, either. Schohl said the rest of the season-ticket packages, which started at $216 for 18 home matches, were sold out in February. About 3,900 season tickets have been sold. With renovations that include adding seat backs in the center sections on both sides of the field, the Hearts of Pine are estimating they have a seating capacity around 5,500 — about 500 less than the city’s pre-renovation estimate. There were slightly less than 100 six-game ticket packages available, as of Friday afternoon, which are priced at $270 for designated midfield seats with backs. It adds up to a likely festive and full atmosphere when the Hearts of Pine finally play a USL League One game at Fitzpatrick at 6 p.m. May 4, against One Knoxville SC. USL League One is considered a third-tier of professional soccer in America. MLS is the lone top-tier league. USL Championship is the only second-tier league. “About 95% of the 5,500 tickets for the May 4 opener are sold and we’re not sure yet whether we’ll have any single-game sale for the opener. Most likely there won’t be,” Schohl said. The Hearts’ ownership group actively began working to bring a USL League One team to Portland in 2019. Coach and Sporting Director Bobby Murphy said Friday the ticket sale success proves that club founder Gabe Hoffman-Johnson and other “people who conceptualized this from the very beginning,” were correct that there was a demand for pro soccer in Portland. The Hearts have already set a season-ticket record for USL League One expansion franchises. The next target, Schohl said, is to break the league’s average attendance record of 4,786 set by Richmond Kickers in 2023. Open Cup tickets available Tickets are available for the March 20 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup first-round game at Lewiston High’s Don Roux field when the Hearts will host CD Faialense, an amateur squad form Cambridge, Massachusetts. General admission seats for the team’s first countable game — and first in Maine — are $17. As of Friday afternoon, 1,865 tickets have been sold for the Open Cup, Schohl said. “We think about 2,000 to 2,500 people can sit comfortably, with others standing if they’d like,” Schohl said. The 110th US Open Cup is a 96-team year-long tournament that includes 32 amateur clubs and squads from all of the country’s professional leagues. Sixteen MLS teams enter the tournament in the Round of 32. Last year, in the 32 first-round games, seven amateur teams beat pro squads. Preseason success The Hearts have played five preseason games and gone 4-0-1 against a variety of opponents. A sixth preseason tilt on Saturday will take place behind closed doors against Rhode Island FC of the USL Championship at Rhode Island’s new 10,500-seat, $137 million soccer-specific stadium in Pawtucket. Rhode Island reached the USL Championship final in 2024. From Feb. 10-17 the Hearts were in Orlando, Florida, primarily for training. They played two split-squad 60-minute games on the final day against college teams from Stetson and junior college Daytona State College, winning both. All of the signed players who have been training in Portland, along with some practice players called trialists, made the trip. A four-day trip to Bermuda featured a 2-0 win against the Bermuda national team and a 0-0 draw against Rhode Island FC on the fourth day. “It shows that when we’re up for it and were organized that we were competitive. We talk about staying in plays and we did that,” Murphy said. “(Rhode Island has) really good players and really good staff so, one, it validates what we’re doing here so far and, two, the players we brought in can do it.” Last Saturday, the Hearts beat Hartford Athletic, another USL Championship team, 4-0 in a closed-door scrimmage. Goals were scored by signed players Walter Varela, Ollie Wright and Jaden Jones-Riley, and one by a trialist. “To be fair it was Hartford’s probably second group. But, you can only play what’s in front of you,” Murphy said. “I thought we were better on the ball than we were against Rhode Island but obviously the competition wasn’t the same. But, yeah, we played hard and we scored four goals which is not easy to do.” In Bermuda, the Hearts were without veteran midfielder Mikey Lopez. After the Florida training session, Lopez had arthroscopic knee surgery. Murphy said Lopez has resumed running and might be ready for the USL League One opener March 29 at Naples (Florida) FC.