RSL Hits Road Saturday at Portland to Complete Three-Game Week

HERRIMAN, Utah (Thursday, April 21, 2022) – Real Salt Lake (3-2-3, 12 pts, 6th West) ventures to the Pacific Northwest this weekend, visiting Portland Timbers FC (2-2-4, 10 pts, 9th West) Saturday night in a rematch of last year’s Western Conference Final. Portland also swept the three-game reg. season series against RSL in 2021, extending RSL’s overall losing run to four games against the Timbers. Since the beginning of 2018, RSL is just 2-8-1 (W-L-T) in MLS reg. season and playoffs against Portland. 

Head Coach Pablo Mastroeni’s side has lost three of five across all competitions, including a pair of historic losses this week. Sunday’s 0-6 loss at New York City FC matched the Club’s worst in its 18-year MLS history, while Wednesday’s home loss in the U.S. Open Cup was just RSL’s second-ever to a lower-division team at home. The weekend’s Portland trip closes out an injury-filled season-opening stanza that saw six out of its first nine games on the road, prior to the Club’s April 30 home match against long-time rival LA Galaxy. Mastroeni has used 24 players already through eight games this season, as MF Nick Besler made his 2022 debut Sunday. 

Wednesday’s match will be broadcast locally via KMYU (12 over the air, 22 satellite and 643 HD on cable), with streaming on the KSL Sports App, as well as ESPN700 AM radio. Spanish-speaking fans can tune in on KBMG Latino 106.3 FM, La Gran D 102.3 FM and KTUB 1600 AM for the local radio broadcast.

Real Salt Lake at Portland Timbers FC

Providence Park; Portland, OR

Saturday, April 23 at 8:00 p.m. MT

Game Notes for Saturday’s RSL @ Portland Match Available Online

The Adobe PDF version of the 2022 MLS Game Guide in advance of Saturday’s contest between Real Salt Lake and Portland can be found here. Media members looking to receive the document as an attachment or have further questions are asked to please contact Meg Van Dyk in RSL Communications via email at meg.vandyk@rsl.com

2022 Records: Real Salt Lake (3-2-3, 12 pts, 6th West); Portland Timbers FC (2-2-4, 10 pts, 9th West)

OTHER 2022 RSL NOTES:

TERRIBLE TIMES ON TURF

RSL owns an all-time MLS regular-season and playoff mark of just 15-39-18 (W-L-T) on artificial surfaces across the league since its 2005 inaugural campaign. In those 72 games, the Utah side has been outscored 127-74, including a 16-22 deficit to the Revolution at Gillette Stadium. RSL is now 5-4-3 all-time at Foxborough, the March 12 win snapping a three-game winless streak. In both 2015 and 2017, RSL lost 0-4 in turf drubbings, prior to a 0-0 draw in its last visit to Gillette, in 2019. From 2010-13, RSL did win three consecutive road matches against the Revs by an aggregate score of 6-2. Next time on the fake stuff? – this Saturday, April 23 at Portland. 

ROAD-HEAVY START

RSL’s trip to Gillette Stadium March 12 marked the second away match in the Club’s first three games this season, which sees RSL travel for six of its first 9 matches overall. Following a Rio Tinto Stadium win against Nashville on March 19, RSL has now gone winless in four with just two points accrued in three road matches at Kansas City, Colorado and New York City FC sandwiched around the 2-2 home draw with Toronto last weekend.

Despite historic anemia away from home, RSL has earned results in six of its last nine overall road contests dating back to 2021. Late regular-season wins in Dallas and Kansas City overcame home stumbles to San Jose/Portland and made the postseason possible, while RSL deserved to advance in the MLS Cup Playoffs with its unforgettable performances at Seattle and Kansas City before falling at Portland in the West Final.

Can RSL regain its 2.00 points-per-game road average established this early part of the year with a response to its worst road performances of the year at NYCFC?RSL now matriculates to the other coast six days later in its bout with 2022 MLS West Champions Portland on Saturday at Providence Park, site of RSL’s postseason loss in the Conference Final a year ago.

RSL finally gets a stretch of eight home games in 12 contests from April 30 to July 9.

RSL EAST COAST HISTORY

In the Eastern Time Zone, RSL is now just 14-41-20 all-time / all competitions, outscored in the previous 75 matches by an aggregate score of 148-73. Five of the 14 wins and 16 of the 73 goals have come in New England, with RSL at .500 or better in NE (5-4-3), PHI (1-1-4) and Cincinnati (1-0-0). RSL owns two wins or fewer in the other eight ET cities – Toronto (2-5-2), Columbus (2-10-2), NYCFC (1-2-0), NYRB (1-6-4), D.C. (1-7-3), Montreal (0-4-0), Orlando (0-1-2) and Atlanta (0-1-0). Will May 22 at Montreal be different?

CASEY AT THE BAT / MONUMENT PARK

Sunday marked RSL’s ninth all-time MLS game played on a baseball diamond, with the 1-2-0 (W-L-T) record at Yankee Stadium part of an all-time 2-5-2 record in games played across an infield. When RSL entered MLS in 2005, D.C. United shared RFK Stadium in Washington D.C. with the MLB Nationals through the 2007 season. During that period, RSL posted an 0-2-1 mark in the Nation’s Capital. From 2008-10, RSL faced the Kansas City Wizards at Community America Ballpark in Kansas City, Kansas, posting a 1-1-1 mark against the team now known as Sporting KC. 

EASTER HISTORY

Sunday also marked just the second occasion in RSL’s 18-year history that the Club played on Easter Sunday, winning its previous road contest in 2015 at San Jose. That day, iconic playmaker Javier Morales provided the game’s lone goal with a stunning free kick in the 44th minute, blasting his initial offering off the wall but quickly slamming the rebound from 30 yards out past Earthquakes ‘keeper David Bingham. RSL GK Nick Rimando needed to make just two saves to post the clean sheet.

This week’s 0-6 bloodbath at Yankee Stadium matched RSL’s worst-ever loss, suffered back in August, 2006 at Giants Stadium against the MetroStars. In that match, an eighth-minute Jack Stewart red card forced RSL to play with 10 men, getting to halftime scoreless. However, in the second 45 minutes, RSL conceded six, as 2005 FW Jordan Cila victimized his former team, future LA Galaxy man Edson Buddle notched a hat trick and Todd Dunivant and John Wolyniec also victimized Jay Nolly and the RSL rearguard.

On Easter Weekend, RSL has played nine other contests, posting an overall 6-2-2 (W-L-T) record, including a 2-1-0 mark away from home. RSL won away in 2017 – 2-1 at Rocky Mountain Cup rival Colorado, with both Yura Movsisyan and Brooks Lennon striking in the 85th and 88th minutes to steal three road points – and away again in 2019, a 3-0 Friday night victory in the Club’s lone visit to Cincinnati that saw an Albert Rusnák brace surround Sam Johnson’s second-ever RSL goal. RSL suffered its previous Easter Weekend road loss back on March 30, 2018 in a 1-3 decision at Toronto, a game that saw Justen Glad, Marcelo Silva and Damir Kreilach each start and play the full 90 minutes.