The 2016 Major League Soccer regular season is behind is. After a hectic Decision Day cemented the MLS Cup playoff picture, Jason Davis looks back on the league's last day prior to the postseason.
Double day
FC Dallas entered Decision Day without easy answers as to how to approach a road date with the LA Galaxy. The only thing on the line for Oscar Pareja's team was the Supporters' Shield, and with Mauro Diaz done for the season with an injury and the conference semifinals likely to test its stamina, hard lineup choices had to be made. The club no doubt wanted to win its second trophy of the season and keep treble dream alive, but that had to be balanced against fatigue and form.
Pareja chose to run out the best team available, and though they didn't get a win in Carson, California, a goalless draw with the Galaxy was enough to secure the Shield. That would have been true, even if the Colorado Rapids hadn't made the result moot with their draw against the Houston Dynamo.
Is Dallas the favorite entering the playoffs? It's hard to say with Diaz injured, but there's no doubting the club's credentials as the league's best team over the course of the season.
Timbers felled
We're guaranteed a new MLS Cup champ in 2016, thanks to one of the worst showings of the day by the defending champions Portland Timbers. With its season on the line, Caleb Porter's team went to Vancouver to face a Whitecaps team already eliminated from playoff contention and laid the proverbial egg.
The task wasn't an easy one, but the manner in which Portland no-showed against Vancouver in the 4-1 loss will surely rile up the faithful back in Oregon. The Timbers dealt with no more debilitating injuries than anyone else and had more than enough talent to meet the low bar of playoff qualification. Last season's championship probably means no major changes are coming, but Portland is supposed to be a different kind of soccer town with a different type of MLS ambition.
Sounders and fury
After failing to lock down an unlikely playoff spot last week, the pressure was on for the Seattle Sounders to take care of business at home against Real Salt Lake. Thanks to an excellent performance from Cristian Roldan, among others, the Sounders won 2-1 and jumped into fourth place in the Western Conference in the process. That means a midweek playoff game against Sporting Kansas City is coming to CenturyLink Field.
Nobody thought the Sounders could recover from the disastrous first half of the season they suffered, however, especially with Clint Dempsey shut down for the season and Sigi Schmid's surprising dismissal. But Nicolas Lodeiro's arrival and the rapid improvement of Roldan and Jordan Morris proved enough to get them into the postseason. The bottom four seeds and a knockout-round playoff game is not where the Sounders ever want to be, but all things considered, it's a remarkable achievement.
Rapid reaction
The Rapids came up short of the Supporters' Shield on Sunday, but Pablo Mastroeni's team did get a big boost ahead of the conference semifinals: Jermaine Jones is back.
The midfielder's return to the field after nearly four months away makes Colorado a much more dangerous team headed into the postseason. What was thought to be a fairly minor knee injury turned out to be an almost fully torn lateral collateral ligament, so there will be questions about his durability and fitness. But with the Rapids' suffocating defensive approach, even a small injection of energy going forward changes the dynamic of their MLS Cup chase.
Lineup limbo
Two teams in the East, where virtually all of the playoff spots were spoken for but seeding was in play, chose to roll out weakened lineups on Decision Day.
Those choices resulted in decidedly different outcomes for D.C. United and the Montreal Impact when it came to the final standings, even as both teams finished their seasons with losses to teams with little to play for. United dropped a 3-2 game to Orlando City, while Montreal fell to a 3-0 loss at New England -- which needed to overcome a minus-12 goal differential to catch the Philadelphia Union for the last spot in the East.
Because of the standings entering the day, Ben Olsen's gamble paid off, while Mauro Biello's did not. The Impact's loss locked D.C. into fourth place, meaning United will host the Impact in the first round of the playoffs in midweek.
Places, everyone
The drama of simultaneous kickoffs had fans in Toronto and New York City closely watching the scoreboard with a bye into the conference semifinals unclaimed entering the day. TFC held out hope that a win at home over Chicago could be paired with an NYCFC loss or draw to lift the Reds into second place in the East.
There was a moment when it looked like that might happen. Toronto went down early against the Fire but roared back with its superior quality to take a lead. Meanwhile, Columbus went into the last half hour in the Bronx tied with NYCFC 1-1.
It wasn't to be for Greg Vanney's team, though. Jack Harrison broke the deadlock for NYCFC before two further goals made sure there would be no comeback for Crew SC. Toronto FC finished third and will host a midweek knockout round match against Philadelphia, while Patrick Vieira & Co. will await results before opening their first-ever playoff campaign on the weekend.