The season will be on the line for the Houston Dynamo when they host the Seattle Sounders on Sunday in Game 2 of the teams’ best-of-three first-round Western Conference playoff series.
Game 3, if necessary, will be played Nov. 10 in Seattle.
The Sounders, the fourth seed in the West, captured the series’ opening match in penalty kicks after the teams were scoreless over the contest’s 90 minutes of regulation. Alex Roldan produced the deciding kick in a shootout as Seattle converted all five chances against Houston goalkeeper Steve Clark.
The Dynamo, the fifth seed, kept pace with Seattle in the shootout until the fourth kick when Erik Sviatchenko pulled his shot wide of the left post. Houston never even had a shot on target during regulation.
Seattle keeper Stefan Frei didn’t have to make a save in regulation in posting his 14th career postseason shutout, second in league history to Kevin Hartman’s 15.
The teams were the top two in defense during the regular season and that prowess showed in Game 1. Seattle has amassed six clean sheets and allowed just three goals while unbeaten in its past eight matches and paced the league in goals-against (35) and shutouts (13) for the second consecutive campaign.
“The overall philosophy we have (is that) defense wins championships,” Sounders coach Brian Schmetzer said Friday. “It’s out there. It’s true in many different sports, and certainly in ours. “It’s probably personnel and philosophy (that has helped us succeed).”
Schmetzer expects the Dynamo to be more aggressive in Sunday’s match.
“(Houston) has to win,” he said. “So, they’ll try and make sure their attacking movements are good, but we’re doing the same thing. We’re not going to go there and just lay back for 90 minutes.”
Houston allowed just 39 goals in the regular season, third fewest across MLS. The Dynamo also led the league with 59.2 percent possession, a strategy that allowed them to control matches and dictate pace of play.
The Dynamo will stick with what they know and hope to use the home pitch to their advantage.
“We will take some confidence back to our house and look forward to having a better performance there,” Houston coach Ben Olsen said. “Our road is a little trickier now, but we are looking forward to playing in front of our fans and forcing a third game.
“We didn’t do enough to create on the offensive end to win in Seattle — we have to do better and I think we will,” Olsen added. “We need to make better decisions.”
Houston will be without star midfielder Adalberto “Coco” Carrasquilla for Sunday’s match after the 2023-24 CONCACAF men’s player of the year was booked for a red card in the 65th minute of Game 1 and will miss Game 2.
–Field Level Media