Galaxy Is Wizards’ First Victim
The most dangerous teams are always those without a victory, and the Kansas City Wizards proved that once again Saturday night.
After losing their first seven Major League Soccer games this season, the Wizards stunned the Galaxy, 2-1, to finally end their struggles and give Coach Bob Gansler a victory in his MLS debut.
First-half goals by Alexi Lalas--yes, that Alexi Lalas--and Chris Klein were enough to send the Arrowhead Stadium crowd of 8,287 home satisfied for the first time this year.
For Lalas, the victory was even bigger. The one-time U.S. national team defender had been on the losing end in 15 of the last 16 MLS games he had played, having lost eight of his last nine last season with the New York/New Jersey MetroStars before being traded to Kansas City and losing seven in a row.
“Obviously, you say it’s a matter of time [until you win again], but you don’t want that much time to go by,” said Lalas, whose two goals this season make him the Wizards’ top scorer.
“I decided that coming out here to the Midwest I was going to throw some different wrinkles into my repertoire,” he joked. “No, that’s a problem. That’s not a good thing when I’m the leading scorer. That’s something that I hope changes very quickly.”
Not that Lalas’ goal was a bad one. It came in the 10th minute, off a corner kick from fellow 1998 U.S. World Cup team member Preki. Lalas managed to get position against Galaxy defender Steve Jolley and powered a header into the back of the net.
“I was kind of startled,” Lalas said. “I haven’t scored on a corner in years because of the tight marking.”
Minutes later, Lalas almost beat his own goalkeeper, Chris Snitko, with a surprise deflection, but the former UCLA keeper--one of six former Bruins on the field--managed to block the ball.
“I was looking to equalize,” Lalas deadpanned.
Instead, it was the Wizards who scored what proved to be the winning goal in the 32nd minute and Preki again was the creator.
This time the midfielder took a pass from Klein, who was deep in the Kansas City half, held the ball up while Klein sprinted downfield and then threaded a pass through to him.
Klein appeared to be offside when the pass was made, but there was no call and he sprinted in alone against Galaxy goalkeeper Kevin Hartman and slotted a shot beneath Hartman’s dive and just inside the right post to make the score 2-0.
It was the first goal in his 23-game MLS career for the former Indiana University player, whose 1997 Hoosier team was 23-0 before being beaten by Galaxy Coach Sigi Schmid’s UCLA team in the NCAA semifinals.
“It feels great to get a win,” Klein said. “It feels good to get three points. With him [Gansler] coming in, we have a new attitude.”
The new coach said he had weaved no magic in his few days in charge.
“They’re not an 0-7 team,” said Gansler, who coached the United States into the 1990 World Cup in Italy. “I reviewed all the films of their games and they could just as well have been 3-4 or 4-3.”
Preki said the same thing.
“I think we were very unlucky in the first seven games,” he said. “We didn’t play like an 0-7 team but we were 0-7. But that’s in the past.”
The Galaxy, meanwhile, is 4-4 and the goals still are not coming, although the one scored by Danny Pena in the 37th minute goes in the highlight film.
Cobi Jones beat Vincente Figueroa on the right wing and floated a cross into the middle. Pena, 20 yards out, let fly with a left-foot volley that crashed into the net off the underside of the crossbar.
The Galaxy created two other clear scoring chances, but Figueroa headed a Welton chip off the goal line and Jones’ shot at an open net flashed just wide left.
The Wizards, winless no longer, were not to be denied.
OTHER MLS GAMES
Reserve Paulo Dos Santos scored the winning goal in the shootout to give the New England Revolution a 1-0 victory over the Miami Fusion in front of a rain-soaked crowd of 11,173 at Foxboro, Mass. . . . Scott Garlick stopped all five shots and R.T. Moore scored the lone shootout goal as the Tampa Bay Mutiny defeated the Chicago Fire, 2-1, at Tampa, Fla. . . . Roy Lassiter had a goal and an assist to help D.C. United end a three-game losing streak with a 2-1 victory over the New York-New Jersey MetroStars in front of 15,499 at Washington. . . . Goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann stopped nine shots in regulation and three in the shootout to help the Colorado Rapids to a 2-1 win over the Dallas Burn before 10,550 at Dallas.
