Eight teams are left. One of them will hoist the MLS Cup 2024 trophy on Dec. 7.
Western Conference Semifinals preview today, with the Eastern Conference version coming tomorrow.
Let’s dive in:
- WHEN: Saturday, November 23 | 10:30 pm ET
- WATCH: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass
- WHERE: BMO Stadium
The Black & Gold are the clear favorites of the remaining field, even if they looked vulnerable in Round One vs. Vancouver. They’ve got home-field advantage from here on out and have made it to six finals of one stripe or another since Steve Cherundolo took over in 2022. Which is to say they’ve got a ton of knockout round equity.
Seattle are a very good team who have mostly lacked the high-end attacking talent to get over the hump in the biggest games since winning the 2022 Concacaf Champions League (now Cup). That includes roughly eleventy-billion one-goal losses to LAFC.
What we’ve seen from LAFC so far
As mentioned, they were pretty poor in the Round One series against Vancouver, eventually brute forcing two wins in three via superior firepower (and still losing on aggregate, which… yeah, doesn’t matter. But I had to throw it in there anyway).
Cherundolo’s gambit over most of the second half of the season – and in the US Open Cup semifinals against Seattle – had been to trade possession and field position for space to counter into. This makes sense against many teams (they did it last year’s West Semifinal against Seattle as well), but the ‘Caps were well prepared. When LAFC play in what has become their preferred 5-2-3 formation, they tend to empty out central midfield and leave themselves vulnerable to teams who can do damage with the ball. That’s how Vancouver controlled huge chunks of Games 1 and 3, and basically all of Game 2.
LAFC, in other words, spent Round One being much better when they actually had the ball. That’s counterintuitive, given how they played down the stretch, but you’ll see on this gem of a goal in Game 1 vs. the ‘Caps:
By halftime of Game 3 Cherundolo scrapped the 5-2-3 entirely, coming out for the second half in a 4-3-3 with an emphasis on some amount of pitch control. It resulted in what was pretty comfortably their best half of the series.
What we’ve seen from Seattle so far
The Sounders scored one goal and registered zero wins in two Round One games vs. the Dynamo, advancing after winning a pair of shootouts. Remember up above when I said they “are a very good team who have mostly lacked the high-end attacking talent to get over the hump in the biggest games”? Yeah. Still true.
The good news is the opportunities should be there:
This isn’t strictly a Whitecaps thing – Seattle had their fair share of the ball in the half-spaces in that USOC semifinal.
The bad news is they didn’t execute then. And they didn’t execute last year vs. LAFC in the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs. Nor did they execute against them in the regular season. And honestly, they didn’t execute against Houston in Round One, as Pedro de la Vega had himself a nightmare of a series after playing pretty well down the stretch.
Maybe they're due?
What will decide the game?
Last year, Denis Bouanga got out into the open field exactly one time. In the decider vs. Vancouver, Mateusz Bogusz capitalized on a turnover as LAFC pressed their way into control of the series. In the Open Cup semis, the Black & Gold earned a penalty during a set-piece scrum.
The smart money is on a low-scoring game with the winner coming from one of the above, or just directly from a set piece (we might even get an Olivier Giroud sighting!). As for whether Cherundolo opts for a 4-3-3 or not, here’s a testimonial from a ‘Caps fan:
“If I was an LAFC fan, I'd hope that Cherundolo has learned and will play a midfield three from the start because when he made that change in Game 3, LAFC truly looked dominant and hardly gave the 'Caps a chance to do anything.”
If the midfield stays open, don’t discount Albert Rusnák’s ability to thread in Jordan Morris. The Sounders play with a lot of structure in their 4-2-3-1 and won’t get run off the field no matter what Cherundolo opts for, of course, but Rusnák was playing the best ball of his MLS career down the stretch.
Who’s more likely to advance?
LAFC.
Seattle will have benefitted from the long break – they needed to get both Morris and Rusnák healthy – but the Black & Gold also needed a break, as they’ve played 49 games across all competitions this year.
They got it. They should be refreshed, they should have their legs under them, they’ve got home-field advantage, and they’ve got Seattle’s number to a historic degree.
- WHEN: Sunday, November 24 | 6 pm ET
- WATCH: Apple TV - MLS Season Pass; FS1, FOX Deportes; TSN, RDS
- WHERE: Dignity Health Sports Park
You can look at the Galaxy in two ways. Way No. 1 is they were a beautiful, ball-playing team who used the ball and their ridiculous attacking quality/depth to compile a 64-point season that had them tied atop the West. Way No. 2 is they were a vulnerable defensive/careless structural team that fell on their faces in big moments throughout the season, which is why they ended up second in the West instead of first. One fewer goal concession and they’d be top.
Minnesota have been under construction (or deconstruction) to one degree or another for the past 13 months. The fact that they’re here… win or lose, this season’s already a success.
What we’ve seen from LA so far
Utter dominance in maybe the most lopsided playoff series in MLS history? I can’t think of a bigger mismatch than what we saw of LA vs. a shorthanded Colorado side that had real orange cone energy throughout their 9-1 drubbing over 180 minutes.
This was actually from their final regular-season win over the Rapids, but it fully tells the story of their playoff dominance as well:
Riqui Puig goes everywhere and anywhere to make the game. The rest of the Galaxy orient their movement around that, and it has produced some brilliant soccer. Young winger Gabriel Pec has been particularly good about understanding how to use the space Riqui’s movement creates, and how to create even more space for the rest of the attack with hard, direct, off-ball movement into the channels.
The downside of all this, as I mentioned, is structural carelessness. It’s kind of baked into how the Galaxy play.
As Joe Lowery pointed out, the good news is LA were more precise with their build-outs against the Rapids, which means fewer turnovers and fewer counterattacks they had to scramble against.
tl;dr, they were awesome. But the Rapids were brutally bad down the stretch and were missing their two best/most important players, so don’t read too much into it.
What we’ve seen from Minnesota so far
The Loons scored one goal and registered zero wins in two games, but they’ve got Dayne St. Clair and you don’t wanna go up against Dayne St. Clair in a PK shootout. So they’re here and Real Salt Lake are in Cabo.
I will lay out who this team has become since a 3-2 loss to Seattle on Aug. 24:
- They have lost just once in 10 games (regular season and playoffs).
- Across those 10 games, they haven’t had 50% possession or more even once.
- They’ve had under 40% possession three times.
- They have the lowest line of confrontation in the league since Aug. 31.
- Their central midfielders are taking roughly 15% fewer touches than they did up to that point.
Here’s their network passing graphic from their scoreless draw at RSL in Game 1 of their Round One series:
It’s a 3-4-2-1 more than a 3-4-3, and the fun bells and whistles are that right center back Carlos Harvey (67) will often step into the midfield to become an extra man, which then allows right wingback Bongi Hlongwane (21) to attack more like a winger. But Bongi only really does that when Minnesota are building up the left-hand side, often through left wingback Joseph Rosales (No. 8 on the graphic, and maybe the most underrated player in the league right now?).
The idea is to shift opponents to that side and leave Bongi isolated as a fullback at the back post to attack crosses in transition.
It… didn’t really work against RSL, as the Claret-and-Cobalt did a pretty good job of making Minnesota build through the middle. Robin Lod and, to a lesser extent, Joaquín Pereyra can do that. But it’s not this team’s first choice.
What will decide the game?
Minnesota are a good team, but this one’s all about Galaxy turnovers. Or perhaps the lack thereof.
If LA play fast and loose, they can very well stake themselves to a 2-0 lead inside half an hour. Or they could very well stake Minnesota to a 2-0 lead courtesy of a couple of Bongi/Kelvin Yeboah counterattacks.
This is the whole thing. The Galaxy aren’t going to change who they are, and the Loons shouldn’t change who they are.
Who’s more likely to advance?
The Galaxy haven’t lost in Carson all year long, and got big performances from Puig, Pec and Dejan Joveljić in their two meetings (win at home, draw on the road) with the Loons this season.
Upsets can happen. This would be a big one.
