HERRIMAN, Utah (Thurs., Oct. 17, 2024) – Real Salt Lake (15-7-11, 56 points, t-3rd West MLS) concludes its 2024 Major League Soccer regular-season slate Saturday night at home against the visiting Vancouver Whitecaps (13-12-8, 47 points, 8th West), with RSL Head Coach Pablo Mastroeni’s team one win away from setting a new Club all-time single-season points record (59), its best in 20 seasons. Saturday’s 7:00p MT kickoff is available via Apple TV+ / MLS Season Pass, as Mark Rogondino & Heath Pearce (ENG) provide the call, as will Francisco X. Rivera and Max Cordaro(SPN).
RSL returns from the recent FIFA international break on an active five-game unbeaten streak, buoyed by a controlling if not dominant 1-0 win in San Jose back on Oct. 5, with Bay Area native and former San Jose academy product Diego Luna scoring the 78th-minute game-winner in support of the Club’s ninth clean sheet of the year. That win improved RSL’s 2024 road record to 5-4-8 / 23 points, allowing RSL to accrue its second-highest road point total in 20 MLS seasons, trailing only last year’s 28-point mark.
Guaranteed a top-four seed in the final 2024 MLS Western Conference standings and home-field advantage in the First-Round, Best-of-Three series, Real Salt Lake can establish a new all-time points record with a win Saturday against the Whitecaps, this season’s 59-point total in that eventuality eclipsing the 57 points accrued in the 2012 season. A 16th win in 34 games would match the Club’s second-highest win total in its 20 MLS campaigns (2013, 2019), trailing only the 17 won in 2012.
This is already the highest-scoring season in Real Salt Lake’s 20 MLS years, with 63 goals through 33 matches, eclipsing the 57 scored in 2013. RSL needs three goals in its final home game on Sat., Oct. 19 against Vancouver to set a new all-time Club home mark and break the 2018 mark of 38 goals on home soil.
Pending other results Saturday involving Cincinnati (at Philadelphia) and Seattle (against Portland), an RSL result could result in the Claret-and-Cobalt returning to continental competition for the first time since 2015/16, as one of 10 MLS berths in the 2025 CONCACAF Champions Cup would go to the Utah side by virtue of its overall regular-season performance.
RSL has already clinched an MLS Cup Playoff spot for the 14th time in the last 17 seasons, and for the fourth consecutive year under the guidance of Head Coach Pablo Mastroeni. The ongoing campaign represents RSL’s eighth 50-point season in Club history – and its first since 2019 – with the 2024 edition of the Claret-and-Cobalt awaiting Sunday’s unveiling of the complete 2024 Audi MLS Cup Playoffs schedule.
Real Salt Lake v. Vancouver Whitecaps FC – MLS Matchday 39
America First Field – Sandy, UT
Saturday, Oct. 19, 2024 – 7:00p MT
Apple TV+ / MLS Season Pass / KSL Sports Zone Radio
HONORING KING KREILACH, CELEBRATING THE 2021 “DAMIRACLE” ::
During a brief pre-game ceremony Saturday, RSL will take a moment to honor and recognize former Captain Damir Kreilach for his contributions to the Club from 2018-23. While his last two seasons were marred by injury, the Croatian star remains the all-time third-leading scorer (47 goals) in Club history, trailing only Alvaro Saborio (63) and Javier Morales (49).
Saturday’s visit with Vancouver marks Kreilach’s first return to the Wasatch Front, with the Decision Day occurance reminding RSL fans of the 2021 “Damiracle” that saw Kreilach score the necessary goal at 94:36 of stoppage time at Kansas City, qualifying RSL for the postseason, knocking out the LA Galaxy and crushing the hearts of Sporting fans in the “Blue Hell."
For more on Damir’s Claret-and-Cobalt legacy, please read “Return of the King” by Daniel Obinyan here: https://www.rsl.com/news/the-legend-of-damir-kreilach-the-return-of-the-king.
2025 CONCACAF CHAMPIONS CUP BERTHS AT STAKE SATURDAY ::
RSL is now locked into either the third- or fourth-overall Western Conference seed, tied on 56 points with Seattle Sounders FC. First-place LA Galaxy (19-7-7, 64 points) and second-place LAFC (18-8-7, 61 points) are out of reach. While RSL has already clinched home-field advantage in the first-round, best-of-three opening series of the MLS Cup Playoffs, at stake Saturday is a potential berth in the 2025 CONCACAF Champions Cup, with RSL, Seattle and Cincinnati jockeying for the final two non-MLS Cup slots.
Should all three teams win Saturday – Seattle hosting Portland in a Cascadia Cup tilt and Cincinnati visiting Philadelphia – the 59-point logjam would leave RSL on the outside looking in based on the MLS “wins” tiebreaker, employed by CONCACAF for the 2025 Cup tourney … However, RSL could still qualify for the 2025 CONCACAF Champions Cup if one of the teams already qualified through this season’s mechanisms – LA Galaxy, LAFC, Miami, Columbus, Colorado, Seattle or Cincinnati – win MLS Cup, allowing the duplicate berth to fall to RSL by virtue of the reg. season performance.
RSL has not enjoyed continental competition since the 2015/16 season, which saw RSL drop a Quarterfinal series to Tigres (LIGA MX).
HOME EXCELLENCE, ROAD RESILIENCE HALLMARKS OF 2024 CAMPAIGN ::
RSL returns home Saturday looking to extend its active unbeaten streak to six games, the current five-game run seeing two wins and three draws highlighted by back-to-back clean sheets. While paling in comparison to the 15-game unbeaten run from March – June – one that started with a 2-1, come-from-behind win at Vancouver on March 23 – the current five-game streak is the second-longest of the season.
America First Field in Sandy is where the Claret-and-Cobalt have excelled this season, with 10 wins and three draws against just three losses in MLS action, in addition to an 11th home win in the August Leagues Cup tourney over LIGA MX power Atlas FC.
With the road win at San Jose earlier this month, RSL – currently 5-4-8 / 23 points away – has secured the Club’s second-highest point total in a road season, surpassing the 2013 total of 22 points, second only to last year’s mark of 8-5-4 / 28 points.
Despite an inconsistent last 90 days, RSL can still set a new all-time single-season record of 59 points with a win Saturday, as well as enter the postseason as the team no one wants to face, in any place, at any stage.
LAMENTING DROPPED POINTS IN RECENT DRAWS ::
While RSL remains on track to potentially eclipse the 57 points amassed in 2012, needing three points against Vancouver to establish a new 20-year high for the Club’s MLS reg. season body of work, recent collapses have seen the Claret-and-Cobalt drop points important to its playoff positioning. A pair of 2-0 leads at Austin Sept. 28 and at home against Portland on Sept. 21 are the most recent examples, while RSL also failed to protect a 2-0 lead back on May 11 at LA Galaxy, conceding a very late stoppage-time equalizer on the last kick of the game.
Earlier this season, RSL was able to extract points late from losing positions as well, scoring three unanswered in the final half-hour to force a 3-3 finish at Dallas in late May, a few weeks after erasing a 2-0 deficit at home to Colorado in an eventual 5-3 win. RSL did equalize at the death at Seattle for a 1-1 draw at Lumen Field just three days after the Dallas heroics.
Scoreless draws at home – like the one Oct. 2 against Minnesota – in mid-April against a heavily-rotated Columbus team and on the road at Montreal in mid-June also jump off the schedule as opportunities lost to bolster points in a season that has seen RSL lose just six road games in three competitions this season, while on the verge of setting a new home standard in Sandy, where the team has historically won 70% of its matches in the last 15 seasons.
FINAL STRETCH OF SEASON / PLAYOFF PUSH FOR PABLO ::
During the Pablo Mastroeni era – qualifying for the MLS Cup Playoffs in each of four seasons – RSL has endured a rollercoaster ride in the final 10 games of each season … One game remains to improve upon the 3W-3L-3T record from July 20 – present in MLS contests.
Back in 2021, RSL split its 10 games under Pablo, winning five and dropping five, securing a dramatic Decision Day win at Kansas City to qualify for the postseason, eventually progressing to the West Final and suffering elimination at Portland.
In 2022, RSL posted a 3-3-4 / 13-point finish, suffering unexpected home draws / losses but delivering yet another Decision Day win, this time a dominant 3-1 home victory over Portland. That year’s RSL side burst out to a 2-0 lead at Austin courtesy an early Sergio Cordova brace in a first-round, single-elimination MLS Cup Playoff match, but a 53rd-minute Rubio Rubin ejection ended up with RSL falling in PKs after 120 minutes.
Last season, RSL went 4-5-1 / 13 points in its final 10 matches, as it learned how to play without injured metronome Pablo Ruiz following his non-contact Leagues Cup Round of 16 injury at LAFC. RSL did win three of its final five last year, including its lone win at LAFC on a late Chicho Arango goal, and a 1-0 Decision Day victory at Colorado, one that saw Diego Luna emerge and announce his presence with authority, scoring four goals in his final five matches of 2023, including the three-game series with Houston. However, the postseason once again saw RSL eliminated by the narrowest of margins, as both games two and three of the first-round series with the Dynamo were decided by PKs.
HOUSTON, WE HAVE A PROBLEM ::
If the 2024 MLS Cup Playoffs presented by Audi began now, RSL would face off for a second consecutive season against the Houston Dynamo. RSL would look to rebound from two years of battles with Houston, a place in which it has not won since the 2018 season, defeating the Dynamo in just three of the last 14 meetings across all competitions. RSL has seen Houston end three different competitions in the 2023/24 campaigns, as RSL fell 1-3 at Houston in last year’s Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup Semifinal in a 120-minute affair, before being ousted from the first round of the 2023 Audi MLS Cup Playoffs in a three-game series that saw the final two legs decided by penalty kicks. On August 5 of this year, RSL fell 0-3 at Houston to suffer elimination from the 2024 Leagues Cup, when nearly any other result would have seen the Utah side win its group, which also included Atlas FC (Liga MX).
Earlier this year, RSL registered a 3-2 come-from-behind home win on July 3 against Houston to snap the recent drought; prior to last year’s reg. season loss, RSL went unbeaten against Houston in 11 consecutive games dating back to 2017, including five straight in South Texas. All-time, RSL owns a 3W-14L-6T record in Houston, with the Dynamo enjoying a +16 goal differential across all competitions, buoyed by last weekend’s 4-1 win over RSL.
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