Rocky Mountain Cup, Playoffs, and a little “I told you so”
October 25, 2009 by f4denz.
I will post a full match review and thoughts on Monday night when I rewatch the match, but I want to put up a post to celebrate the result and the implications of the 3-0 win. The win allowed RSL to keep the Rocky Mountain Cup for the third straight year, Colorado had it the first two years, but that might be the least of the accomplishments on the night. The win was the 11th win for RSL, a record for most wins in a season and moved us up to 40 points on the season which tied our total last year. The 3 goals moved RSL’s total on the year to 43, which ties the 2006 mark for 30 matches (there were 32 matches that year and RSL ended with 45), the shutout was the 10th clean sheet of the year with 9 for Nick Rimando and 1 for Chris Seitz. RSL did set a season mark for fewest goals allowed, just 35 allowed which is a 4 goal improvement from last year and a 10 goal improvement from 2007.
RSL’s 9-1-5 home record was best in MLS and their plus 23 home goal differential was tied for a MLS record, our 43 goals on the season was tied for second most in the league with DC United, FC Dallas lead the way with 50 but it wasn’t enough to get them into the playoffs. Robbie Findley’s two goals moved him up into a 4 way tie for 3rd in MLS, also on 12 goals are Landycakes, GBS, and Juan Pablo Angel, by shutting out Colorado it kept Conor Casey from catching Jeff Cunningham who won the golden boot with 17 goals and 8 assists.
Salt Lake is the smallest market in the league but this year we finished in 5th place in home attendance with an average of 16,375. Tops of the league was Seattle with 30,897, then the LA Galaxy with 20,416, Toronto with 20,344, and Houston with 17,047. When you look at the population comparison between those markets, Seattle has a metro area of 3.3 million, LA has a metro area of 12.8 million, Toronto’s metro area is 5.5 million, Houston has 5.7 million, and SLC has a metro of a just over 1.1 million, it really shows how amazing the support for RSL is.
So despite many of the cynics and critics of the team, the reality is that RSL had a damm good year, not up to their expectations or those of the fans, but still not a bad year. Oh I know we will hear people talking about how we backed into the playoffs and we had to rely on other teams losing and those claims are partially true. We did have to have teams lose so we would get into the playoffs, but at some point of the year every team in the playoffs got there because some other team lost, so the claim that we backed in is simply wrong. When other teams faltered in their attempts to claim a playoff spot, RSL did not, they stepped up and did what was needed and in the end we are in the playoffs. We get the #4 spot in the East and will face off against Supporter Shield winner and defending MLS Champions the Columbus Crew.
I am sure a number of people will doubt our ability to get past the first round, but I will simply offer up a couple things to think of: First, in the 2 matches played between the sides this year RSL won at Rio Tinto 4-1, and Columbus won at Crew Stadium 3-1 and if those results were to play out again that would put RSL through on goal differential. Second, Columbus has struggled in October, in their 4 MLS matches they were 1-3-0 with two of those losses coming at home. RSL on the other hand was 2-1-0 in October with 5 goals for and just a single goal allowed, Columbus scored just a single goal in their 4 matches and gave up 3. Third, home pitch advantage will be huge as RSL was the best team at home(32 of 45 possible points) and Columbus was second best (31 of 45 possible) but RSL is undefeated at home since mid-May and Columbus has dropped their last two home matches.
There is no doubt that RSL will be the underdog in the matchup against Columbus, but I don’t think it will impact the players or staff who in the eyes of many have been underdogs for months. It will be interesting to see what happens on Halloween night at Rio Tinto, well should I say Halloween afternoon as it looks like the match will be a 4pm kick off time, will fans be rewarded with some treats or will Columbus try to play some tricks? All I know is that it should be an exciting match and I hope that every RSL fan will show up and support the team.
I am not going to mention the many people who have doubted for the last couple months, or weeks that RSL could make it but I have learned one thing as a fan and that is to never give up hope. Now RSL sits 3 matches away from the MLS Championship match, I know many will say we can’t do it but in MLS it very often is about what team can string together a couple wins and RSL has as much of a chance as any. There will be no “I told you so”.
OFF MY SOAPBOX
3 wins gets us to Seattle, 4 wins gets us a star