Carlos Coronel made three consecutive penalty shootout saves and Daniel Edelman converted the winning goal in the bottom of the seventh frame as the New York Red Bulls stunned the Columbus Crew to sweep the best-of-three first-round series on Sunday in Harrison, New Jersey.
The score was tied 2-2 after regulation before the Red Bulls won on penalty kicks 5-4.
The defending MLS Cup champion Crew were the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference and had the second-most points — setting club records during the regular season for most goals (72) and points (66) — in MLS behind Inter Miami.
New York, the No. 7 seed, won 1-0 in Columbus on Tuesday.
Columbus leads the all-time series across all competitions 40-37-14. However, the Red Bulls are 23-13-7 at home against the Crew, including 3-0-1 in the playoffs with all three wins coming at Red Bull Arena. New York is 4-1-1 in its last five playoff matches at home.
With the Crew season on the line, Christian Ramirez, who entered 10 minutes earlier, tied it 2-2 in the 96th minute with a header from a corner kick by Alex Matan.
The Red Bulls took a 2-1 lead in the 80th minute on Emil Forsberg‘s penalty kick. He was fouled by Rudy Camacho barely a yard inside the top of the penalty area to set up the kick, which he hammered to the bottom left corner.
Max Arfsten gave Columbus the lead in the 55th minute before Dante Vanzeir equaled nine minutes later.
Arfsten, who entered a minute earlier for DeJuan Jones, took a slick layoff from Cucho Hernandez and curled a shot past Coronel.
The Red Bulls on the transition notched the tying goal when Forsberg found Vanzeir in space for a strike from the left side of the box.
Columbus did everything but score in a dominant first half that had the Crew leading in shots 9-2.
But the Crew had to be wondering if it was just not their day in the 40th minute when within 30 seconds both Diego Rossi and Hernandez hit the left post on consecutive shots and a follow-up attempt by Steven Moreira was blocked by Sean Nealis.
Colonel stopped shootout attempts by Yevhen Cheberko, Arfsten and Matan in the last three of seven rounds. The Red Bulls’ Noah Eile, Wikelman Carmona, Elias Manoel, Forsberg and Edelman found the net.
Columbus was seeking to join the Los Angeles Galaxy (2011-12), Houston Dynamo (2006-07) and D.C. United (1996-97) as repeat winners and keep their quest alive to tie D.C. for second place with four MLS Cups, one behind the Galaxy.
Information from Reuters and The Associated Press was used in this story.
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