The Colorado Rapids and the San Jose Earthquakes secured the last playoff tickets in the West which eliminated the Vancouver Whitecaps. The Rapids took it with a 1-0 win over the Western Conference’s top team, the Portland Timbers on Wednesday night.
Kellyn Acosta played the heroes in the 83rd minute for the Rapids. He was able to create space in front of the defender before lodging the ball in the skylight with a perfect shot.
The Timbers came very close to leveling the mark late in the game. Returning from an injury, Dairon Asprilla saw his strike finish its run off the post in the 96th minute. The Rapids have a points-per-game differential that prevents them from being caught by the Whitecaps.
“We tried to find in the second half more chancessaid. We did it and we missed a couple of good chances. At the end, they found the goal and that was the big, big difference in the game. We were not very efficient, and we need to improve that for the next game,” Timbers midfielder Diego Valeri said.
For their part, the San Jose Earthquakes recorded all three points with a victory of 3 to 2 in front of Los Angeles FC. They have 30 points, six more than the Canadian formation which remains at the ninth echelon.
LAFC opened the scoring in the 23rd minute, but Eduard Atuesta scored his own goal less than five minutes later.
Chris Wondolowski took advantage of a superb handover from Cristian Espinoza moments later to put San Jose in the driver’s seat.
The Earthquakes evolved with 10 players on the field from the 61st minute, while Jackson Yueill received his second yellow card after a tackle.
Espinoza still doubled his team’s lead 11 minutes later. This goal made the difference, as Diego Rossi hit the target in the dying moments of the game.
