Diego Luna scored the deciding goal in a penalty-kick shootout, leading Real Salt Lake past the Houston Dynamo on Monday night in Sandy, Utah, and extending the teams’ first-round Western Conference playoff series to a decisive third match. The match finished 1-1 through regulation, and RSL won the shootout 5-4. Salt Lake goalie Zac MacMath saved the first attempt of the shootout, from Amine Bassi. Each player from both teams converted the rest of the

Paul Arriola and Jesus Ferreira each scored within the first 18 minutes to lead FC Dallas to a 3-1 win over the visiting Seattle Sounders on Saturday night in Match 2 of their first-round best-of-three MLS Cup playoff series. The result sets up a winner-take-all Match 3 in Seattle next Friday. Jader Obrian also scored for FC Dallas, while Jordan Morris tallied Seattle’s only goal of the match. The Sounders took a three-match shutout streak

Wilder Cartagena scored on a sensational long-range effort shortly before halftime and Orlando City held on for a 1-0 victory over visiting Nashville SC on Monday night in the first match of their best-of-three first-round MLS Eastern Conference playoff series. The goal, only Cartagena’s second in his MLS career (regular and postseason), gave Orlando its first playoff victory since 2020. The Lions’ previous playoff triumph came in dramatic fashion, as Orlando prevailed on penalty kicks

Logan Ndenbe, Remi Walter, Gadi Kinda and Daniel Salloi all scored goals as eighth-seeded Sporting Kansas City roundly outplayed top-seeded St. Louis City to earn a resounding 4-1 upset victory in a first-round playoff match on Sunday night in St. Louis. The heavy downpour didn’t deter Sporting Kansas City, a team that went winless (0-7-3) in its first 10 matches and didn’t qualify for the postseason until the final day of the regular season. Now

Diego Luna scored the tying goal in the 76th minute as Real Salt Lake salvaged a 2-2 tie against the Los Angeles Galaxy on Saturday night at Carson, Calif. Anderson Julio also scored for Real Salt Lake, who overcame a 2-0 first-half deficit to avoid a costly setback. The tie leaves Real Salt Lake (13-12-8, 47 points), one point behind the fourth-place Houston Dynamo in the competition for a top-four Western Conference playoff spot and

Sam Surridge scored his long-awaited first two goals in MLS play and Nashville SC held on to a 3-2 victory over the visiting New England Revolution on Saturday night. Dax McCarty added his first regular-season goal since September 2020 for Nashville (13-10-10, 49 points), which pulled within a point of sixth place Atlanta and three of fifth place New England (14-9-10, 52 points) in the Eastern Conference standings with one match left to play. If