Major League Standings: Independence Day Weekend

If you told me at this time two years ago, I would be this excited about a draw, I'd laugh in your face. This time though, a draw was a good road result and most of the West played each other, giving the Sounders an ability to make up some ground. Overall only one result went the wrong way for Seattle this week.

Friday 7/1

Chicago Fire 1 - San Jose Earthquakes 0: Kick things off right with an East team that had no business getting points in this one according to the standings, stealing all three against a mid-conference SJ side. John Goossens picked up the goal in the 58th and has a great name. Former Sounders Chad Barrett and Cordell Cato subbed on late but couldn't help the Quakes break through.

Real Salt Lake 1 - D.C. United 1: Again East v. West and a fairly helpful result. Can't ask for DC to win on the road in their current form (or in any form) at RSL but even the draw was unexpected. After giving up a goal to El Burrito in the 57th and an inability to get postive possession till the 70th or control the tempo till the 85th, it sermed DC was destined to lose. Jared Jeffery found the back of the net in the 2nd minute of stoppage and like that, it was 1-1 and over. RSL falls to a Sounders reserve squad on PKs and then drops two points late to a poor DC side, not a good week in Utah soccer.

Saturday 7/2

Montreal Impact 3 - New England 2: High scoring affair that saw two players find the net twice with Kei Kamara scoring twice in the first 33 minutes. Michael Salazar scored minutes before, then minutes after the half converting his first and second MLS goals. Ignacio Piatti converted a 54th minute PK to end it. Also they did that all without Didier Drogba.

Toronto FC 1 - Sounders FC 1: The unfortunate Jordan Hamilton was quickly earsed by a Joevin Jones long ball to Jordan Morris. Everything about it was beautiful. And it secured a road point in match where Chad Marshall had leave and have Tony Alfaro play the second half with Zach Scott after both going 120 on Wednesday.

Houston Dynamo 1 - Philly Union 0: Another top of the East side loses to the West. The top teams in the East, Philly and Montreal, made a small habit of losing to bottom of the West sides (cough Seattle cough, we invented beating Philly) and did it again here. It took 87 minutes but Houston got the advantage they needed when Joshua Yaro saw a second yellow. Eight minutes later in the 5th minute of stoppage, Cristian Maidana converted a free kick from just outside the 18-yard box to get three points for the Orange. While we would've preferred any West team drops points, Houston is at the bottom too, it's okay.

Sunday 7/3

NYCFC 2 - New York Red Bulls 0: Not the same thriller that produced a 7-0 NYRB blowout but a good one with Man City Lite picking up two goals before Chris Duvall was sent off for a hard foul in the 79th and effectively ended Red Bulls come back hopes.

Sporting Kansas City 3 - Columbus Crew 2: Ola Kamara continued his scoring run as the loan Kamara in CLB picking up two. A list of who's who had the SKC goals with Benny Feilhaber converting a PK. Graham Zusi getting the lead and Matt Besler with the winner in stoppage time. With Kamara’s second goal that made it 2-2 it looked like CLB would survive Tyson Wahl’s red that gave KC the PK in the 49th but they crumbled to a late onslaught of crosses by the home side. This is the worst result of the weekend for the standings.

Monday 7/4

Rapids 0 - Timbers 0: Are we actually going to catch Colorado? No. So maybe them winning would have been better for the Sounders, with the Timbers dropping all the points. Overall a pretty boring match from two teams that love to produce boring draws.

FC Dallas 4 - Orlando City 0: Bad week for the Florida side losing to a NASL side in the Open Cup then getting blown out by Dallas. If you like watching goals, just watch the highlights. It gets a bit depressing, especially if you care at all about Orlando. Or watch for Brek Shea crumbling against his former club.

LA Galaxy 2 - Whitecaps 0: A draw would've likely been better but Vancouver consistently has been the team with the worst PPG of playoff squads meaning that them dropping points will help Seattle. Robbie Keane is back and that sucks but Nigel de Jong picked up a fairly late red after it was 2-0 for a bad tackle and will miss the match against Seattle, so there's a win.

Good news, we have games in hand and are not in last place. Bad news, we are still five points back of the next team in the West. Until we win what’s in hand, those points are not ours but this weekend’s "six-pointer" with a de Jong-less LA side is a good place to find points.

www.mlssoccer.com/standings