By Sean Donahue - Revolution Recap radio show
Major League Soccer’s New England Revolution silenced their critics with a 5-4 penalty kick victory over the USL First Division's Rochester Raging Rhinos on Wednesday night. Much of the talk leading up to the game circled around the Revs’ decision to rest key players in previous Open Cup matches, but they could not be accused of that this time as they put out their best available team and got a hard fought victory over their old Open Cup foes.
The Revs faced a tough task traveling to Rochester’s new PAETEC Park for the first time to face the former champion Rhinos, but they had the better of the play for much of the match and out shot the Rhinos 18 to 12, while putting 7 on target to the Rhinos 3. Scott Vallow made some superb saves to preserve the 0-0 draw through overtime and again on the Revs first two penalty attempts, but he could not stop the next 5, including the eventual winner by Jeff Larentowicz, as the Revs advanced to the quarterfinals for just the third time in club history.
The Rhinos started brightly in front of their home crowd and forced Revs ‘keeper Matt Reis into the first save of the game in the 12th minute on a blast from distance by Johnny Menyongar.
It would be the Revs who took over from there however, as Pat Noonan forced Vallow into a good save in the 23rd minute. Thirteen minutes later, it was more of the same as a shot from Larentowicz forced the Rhino’s keeper into another save in what would be the last real chance of a fairly uneventful first half.
Twenty-four minutes into the second half, the Revs brought on rookie forward Willie Simms and Uruguayan playmaker Jose Cancela for Taylor Twellman and Joe Franchino in hopes to add a spark to the attack. Simms did just that, continuously getting in dangerous spots and pestering the Rhinos defense, but his finishing let him down as he was unable to hit the target on several key chances.
Andy Dorman, the catalyst of the Revs attack for much of the season, almost put the Revs in front in the 76th minute, but Vallow once more proved the hero, making yet another key save. Two minutes later Vallow was called upon again as Cancela put a shot on frame.
Possibly the Rhinos best chance of the game came from the Revolution with less than ten minutes in regulation when Dorman dispossessed Rhinos forward, but redirected the ball towards the Revolution goal. A diving save from Reis prevented what looked like an embarrassing own goal.
The teams headed into overtime with history against the Revs. The Revs had failed in their seven previous attempts under Steve Nicol to win a game that went into overtime. The Revs looked willing to attack still, and Willie Simms again sparked some Revs’ attacks in overtime, but the end result continued to be the same as he saw a couple of golden chances go just high or be stopped by continued superb play from Vallow. His counterpart, Reis, on the other end of the field went relatively untested in overtime, though he was forced into a good saves right before the end of the first period and near the start of the second.
Just before the end of overtime, Jose Cancela almost provided the game winner with an excellent solo effort, but his shot sailed just wide of the target.
The Revolution headed into the shootout with the odds stacked against them. In the Revs only two previous appearances in knockout competition shootouts the Revs ended up on the losing end, including a loss to the Rhinos on PKs the last time these two teams met in the 2004 US Open Cup. Mike Ambersley and John Ball scored on the Rhinos first two attempts, while Shalrie Joseph and Andy Dorman saw their shots stopped by acrobatic saves from Vallow to give the Rhinos a dominating 2-0 advantage. The Revs caught a break on the next two shots as Matthew Delicate sent his shot high and Tenywa Bonseu sent his into the crossbar, before Jose Cancela and Steve Ralston leveled it at 2 a piece. Aaran Lines then scored the next one for Rochester, meaning the Revs would have to score their next penalty to stay alive. With their Open Cup hopes on the line, Matt Reis stepped up and blasted it past Vallow to send it into the sudden death rounds. Both Kenney Bertz for the Rhinos and James Riley for the Revs scored their penalties to send it to a 7th round. Frankie Sanfilippo sent his shot wide and Jeff Larentowicz continued his break out season by scoring the final penalty to give the Revs the 5-4 victory in the shoot-out.
The Revs advance to the Quarterfinals to face either the Kansas City Wizards at Lusitano Field in Ludlow, Massachusetts or the Chicago Fire at the brand new Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Illinois on August 23rd at 7:30 PM ET. The Kansas City versus Chicago match scheduled to take place just an hour after the Revs kicked off with the Rhinos was postponed due to severe weather, so the Revolution will have to wait to see who they face in the next round. The win improves the Revs record in Open Cup play to 6 wins and 6 losses, while the Rhinos drop to a still impressive record of 18 wins and 10 losses.
