The Eastern Conference race is going down to the wire, and the Philadelphia Union and Sporting Kansas City each have a golden opportunity to move in front of the other contenders.
The teams meet with a chance to take over first place in an important showdown Friday night at Livestrong Sporting Park.
Third-place Philadelphia (9-7-12) defeated East-leading Columbus 1-0 on Saturday, ending an eight-game winless streak and making Friday's match even more important.
Barring a draw, the winner would take over the conference lead for at least one day.
Before last weekend, the Union hadn't won since beating New England on July 17, enduring an 0-3-5 stretch.
"It was a tough two months without a win," coach Peter Nowak told the league's official website. "I think we broke the curse. We've been waiting a long time for this."
Kansas City (10-9-10), one point back of Columbus in second place, fell 1-0 to Real Salt Lake on Saturday - the first time it was held scoreless in 15 games and only its third loss in 21 contests.
"We've played very well for a long time now," coach Peter Vermes said. "We're not going to change a bunch of things. We're a good team, and we have the ability to play with anyone in this league. We need to do that in these last five games of the season."
Kansas City plays three of those contests at home, including another East showdown with Columbus on Wednesday. It's a stretch in which the team's unbalanced home-away schedule may play to its advantage.
Sporting played its first 10 games on the road while construction finished on its new stadium. Kansas City then went 5-2-2 during an MLS-record nine-game homestand July 23-Sept. 10 to improve to 7-2-5 overall on its own turf.
Though playing most of the latter part of its schedule at home may be a benefit, Kansas City must overcome a 3-7-5 record on the road come playoff time.
"Obviously the home games were great for us with the atmosphere, but we have to play these games away against good opponents when it comes time for the playoffs," said Teal Bunbury, who is third on the team with seven goals behind Kei Kamara and Omar Bravo (eight each).
Philadelphia may consider itself lucky to remain in the race at all after a dismal stretch.
Sebastien Le Toux, who has scored six of his team-leading seven goals in the last six games, scored in the 32nd minute Saturday.
"Certainly we've played well enough to win in the course of eight weeks," defender Danny Califf said. "We felt a bit snakebitten for a while, and to finally get that win – in probably one of the biggest games of club history – is a big relief."
Philadelphia and Kansas City played to a scoreless draw June 22, though the Union outshot Sporting 7-1 and had multiple scoring chances late in the second half.
The Union lost 2-0 at Kansas City last season, with Kamara opening the scoring.
