Calen Carr could be back for the Dynamo for Sunday's MLS Cup game after injuring his leg earlier in the playoffs against Sporting KC. (Kansas City Star)
For the first time since the Eastern Conference semifinals, the entire Dynamo squad is training this week. Forward Calen Carr, who hasn't played since the second game of the Eastern Conference semifinal, is back.
Legendary Dynamo coach Dominic Kinnear was stunned tonight when I pointed out that the Dynamo are in a conference final for the fifth time in seven years. That's a pretty amazing run by the men in Orange, who showed their fighting spirit yet again Sunday night. What does this say about your team, Dom?
Don't look now, but second-year forward Will Bruin is using the 2012 postseason as his personal showcase. Adam Moffat's majestic shot will get all the attention, and deservedly so. That rocket will be one of the best goals of this postseason regardless of what happens the rest of the way, but it wouldn't have been Read More
BRIDGEVIEW, Ill.-- When the Chicago Fire and Columbus Crew squared off on Saturday night it was
the Crew that had everything to play for and the Fire just playing out the string. You wouldn't
have known it based on how both teams came out though, as the Fire completed a strong finish to the
2011 season with another victory while the Crew stumbled their way into the post-season.
Andy Najar has been suspended two additional games by the MLS Disciplinary Committee, meaning he'll miss all of D.C. United's Eastern Conference final against the Houston Dynamo. Najar had already sat out the mandatory one game suspension he received after being shown a red card for throwing the ball at the referee in the first leg of the Eastern Conference semifinals against theNew York Red Bulls.
After a great season, Sporting KC was eliminated from the MLS Cup Playoffs. SportingKC has a recap of the game:
Sporting Kansas City was eliminated from the 2012 MLS Cup Playoffs on Wednesday, falling 2-1 on aggregate after a 1-0 victory over the Houston Dynamo at LIVESTRONGSporting Park in the second leg of the Eastern Conference Semifinals.
Sporting Kansas City hosts the Houston Dynamo at 8:00 p.m. CT on Wednesday at LIVESTRONG Sporting Park in the decisive second leg of the Eastern Conference Semifinals in the 2012 MLS Cup Playoffs.
The game will be streamed online at MLSSoccer.com.
The mid-week match-up comes three days after Houston prevailed 2-0 in the opening leg on Sunday at BBVA Compass Stadium with goals from Adam Moffat and Will Bruin.
Sporting KC lost to the Houston Dynamo 2-0 last night in the first game of the Eastern Conference Semifinals. Sporting KC will host the next leg of the series, Wednesday at 8pm. Here is the game recap via sportingkc.com:
Sporting Kansas City fell 2-0 at the Houston Dynamo in the first leg of the Eastern Conference Semifinals on Sunday at BBVA Compass Stadium.
The Houston Dynamo may have entered Wednesday night's Eastern Conference wild card round playoff game against the as the lower seed, but they never quite had the feeling of an underdog.
The Dynamo never looked like the underdog on Wednesday, outplaying the Fire on their home field for much of Wednesday night.
Sporting KC will be heading to Houston on Sunday for the first leg off the Eastern Conference semifinals. Tonight in Chicago, the Houston Dynamo completely out played the Chicago Fire as they won 2-1 thanks to a pair of goals from Will Bruin. The Dynamo came out strong from the start and controlled the game.
The Houston Dynamo will play the Chicago Fire at Toyota Park in the 2012 Eastern Conference Knockout Round playoff game. The game will be played Wednesday at 8 p.m. CT. It can be seen nationally on ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes.
The winner of Wednesday's Knockout Round game will advance to the Eastern Conference semifinals, and will face Sporting Kansas City in a two-leg playoff series.
With a few games still left to go this weekend, Sporting KC already knows which two teams they will be potentially facing in the Eastern Conference semifinals. With New York defeating Philadelphia and DC and Chicago drawing 1-1, Sporting KC will meet up against the Chicago Fire or Houston Dynamo. The Eastern Conference rankings are finished, Chicago will finish 4th and host the Houston Dynamo who will finish in 5th no matter how their match up tonight against Colorado ends.
Houston Dynamo midfielder Brad Davis has been named to Major League Soccer's Best XI, league
commissioner Don Garber announced today. It is the first career Best XI selection for Davis, a
finalist for the 2011 MVP award, which will be announced on Nov. 18, and a four-time MLS
All-Star.
The MLS Best XI recognizes the league's top 11 players at each position on the field - one
goalkeeper, three defenders, five midfielders, and two forwards.
Philadelphia Union vs. Houston Dynamo
November 03, 2011 -- Robertson Stadium
Eastern Conference semifinals -- Game 2
Attendance: 24,749
Scoring Summary:
HOU -- Brian Ching 1 (Brad Davis 2) 48+
Philadelphia Union -- Faryd Mondragon, Sheanon Williams, Carlos Valdes, Danny Califf,
Gabriel Farfan (Roger Torres 66), Michael Farfan, Brian Carroll, Veljko Paunovic (Freddy Adu 66),
Sebastien Le Toux, Jack McInerney, Danny Mwanga (Justin Mapp 66).
Houston Dynamo's Dominic Kinnear is the guest on the latest installment of the KYW Philly Soccer
Show podcast as KYW's Greg Orlandini and Philly Soccer Page writer Eli Pearlman-Storch sit down
with the two-time MLS Cup winning coach to discuss the Philadelphia Union's series with
Houston.
David Beckham and Thierry Henry will hope to lead their clubs to a playoff win this weekend.
(Getty Images)
I already submitted some picks for the playoffs over at BigDSoccer.com, you can read them there
but seeing how I was wrong on one of them already I figured I can get a pass and just focus on the
final eight here.
The Houston Dynamo's 3-1 victory over the Los Angeles Galaxy has completed the match-ups for the
2011 MLS playoffs, with the Dynamo rising to No. 2 in the East with their season-ending
victory.
Here are the match-ups heading into the post-season, which the wild card matches taking place at
mid-week and the conference semifinals beginning on Saturday:
WILD CARD ROUND
Wednesday- (4) New York Red Bulls at (1) FC
Dallas
Thursday- (3) Columbus Crew at (2) Colorado
Rapids
Its really unfortunate that D.C. United and the New York Red Bulls had to swap dates in their home-and-home series in the Eastern Conference Semifinals of the 2012 MLS Cup playoffs. But it had to be done.
On our podcast this week, I came up with an alternate plan that might help give United its rightful advantage back, since D.
The New York Red Bulls and D.C. United have agreed to switch home dates for their two-legged series in the Eastern Conference semifinals. Red Bull Arena has not had power since Monday due to damage from Hurricane Sandy that devastated [...]
The post Hurricane Forces DC-NY Series Schedule Change appeared first on Soccer Perspectives.
The New York Red Bulls hadn't won a road game in five months, but with a bye into the Eastern Conference semifinals on the line, the Red Bulls finally showed their capable of taking three points away from Red Bull Arena.
Kenny Cooper scored a pair of goals, and Thierry Henry added his own beautiful finish, to help the Red Bulls cruise to a 3-0 victory against the Philadelphia Union on Saturday afternoon.
KANSAS CITY, Kan. - To call Marco Pappa an enigmatic player at times might be an
understatement.
The Chicago Fire midfielder joined the Fire on a loan during the 2008 season, which was later
extended into a permanent move. At times, he's been one of the league's most talented players. At
other times though, he's been criticized for not putting forth a complete effort.
Matt Pickens, Colorado Rapids (Missouri State 2003) by Garrett Ellwood/Getty Images
Matt Pickens (Missouri State 2003) and his Colorado Rapids teammates help open the Major League
Soccer playoffs on Thursday evening when they host the Columbus Crew in the 1st Leg of a home and
away Quarterfinal.
In honor of Paul the Octopus who died at the age of 2 today, I shall endeavor to accurately
predict the results of the 2010 MLS Cup Playoffs which begin Thursday. Of course, just making my
predictions alone isn't enough to honor the great psychic octopus. So in order to do this properly,
I've recruited my cat Mr.
I recently had the pleasure of getting Tony Limarzi to answer a few questions for me. You know him
as the radio voice of United and the face of Access United, here he is answering questions about
television and United!
Tony, Thank you so much for answering a few questions for the blog! We look forward to hearing your
goal calls more than ever in the upcoming season.
The Columbus Crew announced Sigi Schmid would not return as head coach for the
2009 season (ASN, Dec. 10, 2008).
Schmid was hired as the Seattle Sounders head coach just one week later, the first of many right
moves made by the expansion club. The Crew hired Robert Warzycha to replace Schmid.
Major League Soccer's MVP, Guillermo Barros Schelotto, set up all three
Columbus Crew goals to win his team its first MLS Cup 3-1 over the New York Red Bulls (ASN, Nov.
23, 2008).
The Columbus Crew repeated as Supporters Shield trophy winners with the best regular season
record, but were unable to match last year's playoff run.
After aggressively challenging New England keeper Matt Reis for a ball in the 52nd minute of
Saturday night's decisive Game 2 victory over the Revolution, Fire forward Brian McBride had to be
taken off of the field due to injury.
McBride, who missed 8 weeks earlier this year with a torn right labrum, picked up a knock on his
IT band in the collision, stiffening his leg to the point that he wasn't able to effectively
run.
After losing the first leg of their Eastern Conference Semifinal series with New England 2-1,
the Fire stormed back in dramatic fashion tonight, getting a 2-0 victory to advance to the Eastern
Conference Finals on a 3-2 aggregate score.
Cuauhtemoc Blanco and John Thorrington scored the goals for the Fire, who will take on fourth
seeded Real Salt Lake in the Conference Final next Saturday at Toyota Park.
It all comes down to this for the Fire. They need to defeat the Revs tonight at Toyota Park to
have any hope of advancing to the Eastern Conference Final against Real Salt Lake. Will they do it?
We'll find that out later, but I'll be here to walk you through the whole process with Fire
Confidential's first all-day blog.
The first Eastern Conference finalist will be determined tonight, when the first seeded Columbus
Crew play host Real Salt Lake in Game 2 of their Eastern Conference Semifinal series (7 p.m. CDT on
ESPN2).
The Crew fell to Real Salt Lake 1-0 in the series opener last Saturday and they'll need a win to
have hope of continuing their 2008 title defense.
Teal Bunbury doesn't accept success as a given, even if things are set up quite nicely for him
on a couple of levels.
Bunbury, who scored both goals in Sporting Kansas City's 2-0 victory over the Colorado Rapids in
the first leg of the MLS Eastern Conference semifinals, has the scales tilted heavily in his favor
heading into Wednesday night's second leg match at Livestrong Sporting Park (Wed.
Teams that can't score don't make it far in the postseason, and the Colorado Rapids are a team
that can't score.
The latest evidence came Sunday evening as the Rapids fell 2-0 to Sporting Kansas City in the
first leg of the Eastern Conference semifinals.
Colorado, which edged the Columbus Crew 1-0 in the wild card match on Thursday, couldn't
generate legitimate threats as Sporting spent the evening shoving them around the field.
The Colorado Rapids' uphill battle in the Eastern Conference Semifinals just got tougher.
Kosuke Kimura, Drew Moor and Caleb Folan are all expected to miss extended time after picking up
injuries in the first leg of the home-and-home series against Sporting Kansas City, the Rapids
announced Monday.
Sporting KC kicks off their playoff campaign tomorrow night in Colorado against the Rapids in the
first leg of the Eastern Conference semifinals. KC split the season series with the Rapids, drawing
both games 1-1. In the game out in Colorado Conor Casey scored in the 13th minute after a poor back
pass.
The Colorado Rapids' hopes of defending its MLS title are still alive, and the club can thank
Omar Cummings for that.
Cummings scored his first goal in nearly three months to help lift the Rapids to a 1-0 win over
the Columbus Crew in a wild card playoff match at Dick's Sporting Goods Park on Thursday night.
When their season on the line, the Fire needed a big-time performance from the back line in
Saturday night's second leg of the Eastern Conference Semifinals against the New England
Revolution. And did the defense ever deliver, putting together a comprehensive performance to shut
down (and shutout) the Revolution and pave the way for the Fire to get into the Eastern Conference
Final.
The Fire came into last Sunday's Game 1 of their Eastern Conference Semifinal series against the
New England Revolution with high hopes that they could leave Boston with a result.
And though the Fire got off to the right start in the series opener - scoring an early goal to
put the pressure on New England - the team was undone by a pair of defensive lapses and ultimately
fell to the Revolution 2-1.
Sporting KC enters the MLS Cup playoffs as the number one seed in the Eastern Conference. Sporting KC recaps the game.
Sporting Kansas City defeated the Philadelphia Union 2-1 in front of a sold out crowd on Wednesday night at LIVESTRONG Sporting park, securing the top seed in the Eastern Conference and the second seed overall in the 2012 MLS Cup Playoffs.
