Galaxy beat Herediano to reach quarterfinals of CONCACAF Champions Cup
The Galaxy made history last season, winning a record sixth MLS Cup, going unbeaten in 21 matches at Dignity Health Sports Park and becoming the first team to have four players reach double digits in both goals and assists.
Less a month into the new season the team made history of a different sort by becoming the first reigning MLS champion to lose its first four games. Which brings us to Wednesday's CONCACAF Champions Cup game with Herediano.
The Galaxy's dominant 4-1 win won't count in the MLS standings, but it certainly counts everywhere else. By reversing a one-goal loss to Herediano last week in Costa Rica, Wednesday's result gave the Galaxy a 4-2 aggregate-goal victory in the two-leg CONCACAF round-of-16 playoff, lifting the team into the quarterfinals of the confederation's most prestigious club competition for the first time in a decade.
The team will face Mexican club Tigres, the 2020 tournament champion, in a two-game series next month.
But more importantly, the win showed the Galaxy may be ready to reverse the curse that has plagued them this season. And it was midfielders Isaiah Parente and Harbor Miller, who spent most of last season playing for Ventura County FC, who provided the spark, combining for three assists.
The Galaxy's start this year was as dismal as last season was brilliant. Nor only did they fail to win a game, they didn't even lead in one. They lost on turf and natural grass. They lost at home and on the road. They lost in the U.S., Canada and Costa Rica, scoring just once and getting shut out three times. Three of the losses came in MLS play, equaling the team's longest losing streak in five seasons.
Galaxy coach Greg Vanney made no excuses for his team's abysmal start, but there were explanations. Five starters, including midfield motor Riqui Puig and winger Joseph Paintstil, two of last year's leading scorers, are injured. Four others, including MLS Cup MVP Gastón Brugman and forward Dejan Joveljc, who scored a playoff-high six goals, had to be traded to get the team under the league's tight salary cap.
Vanney can't replace all of that offense, but in Parente and Miller he appears to have found two players who can at help pick up the slack.
Neither played more than 15 minutes in the first two losses but both have started the Galaxy's last two games and the difference had been dramatic, with the team dominating both matches in times of possession, shots and shots on goal and showing signs it is about to wake from its slumber.
Julian Aude gave the Galaxy their first lead of the season in he 30th minute Wednesday, one-timing a soft one-bounce cross from Parente off the left post.
The assist was Parente's first with the Galaxy but he would get another before the first half ended, with Miguel Berry doubling the lead in the 38th minute after Parente set him up by playing a far-post cross from Tucker Lepley back into the center of the box.
That gave the Galaxy a 2-1 lead in aggregate goals in the two-game playoff but they didn't stop there. Gabriel Pec, the Galaxy's only healthy designated player, made it 3-0 eight minutes after the intermission, this time off an assist from the teenaged Miller. And with a frustrated Herediano pushing for an away goal to get back in the playoff, Christian Ramirez closed out the scoring with a goal against the run of play in the 76th minute.
The Galaxy also got a big game out of goalkeeper John McCarthy. McCarthy was the team's starter last season, winning his second MLS Cup in three seasons. But Vanney went with Novak Micovic in the first three regular-season games this year and Micovic was beaten a conference-worst seven times.
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