Football
ESPN staff 7y

Sounders' three-goal surge in beating FC Dallas wows Brian Schmetzer

The Seattle Sounders' three-goal surge against FC Dallas on Sunday night was unlike anything interim coach Brian Schmetzer has seen in his 15 years with the club.

Nelson Valdez opened the scoring in the 50th minute and Nicolas Loderio added two more inside the next eight minutes to give Seattle all of its scoring of a 3-0 win in the first leg of its Western Conference semifinal.

Schmetzer's time with the Sounders predates the club's move to MLS, and he said Sunday's outburst was among the best stretches the team has ever enjoyed.

Asked if he had experienced anything like it before, Schmetzer said, "No. I'd have to look at the stats, I'd have to Google search that. Over the years, we might have had some flurries like that, but right now I'm just thinking about tonight's eight minutes."

The Sounders controlled 63 percent of possession in the first half, though it was still goalless at the break, and Schmetzer said that was to be expected.

"It was a typical first-leg game in a two-leg series -- two teams feeling each other out in the first half," Schmetzer said. "In the second half, our team made the necessary adjustments, but then they also made the necessary plays.

"When you're trying to win an MLS cup, you have to make plays. Valdez, Loderio, [Jordan] Morris, [Joevin] Jones -- they make plays."

FC Dallas coach Oscar Pareja said his team was punished for letting Seattle dictate the pace after halftime.

"In the second half, in the first 20 minutes, Seattle outplayed us. We have to accept that," Paerja said. "Tonight we played against a very good team. That first 20 minutes they were very sharp. We allowed them to get in those spaces and score those goals.

"We have to accept that they were much, much better, especially during that part of the game."

This is the third straight year the Sounders and Dallas have met in the semifinals. Seattle prevailed in 2014; Dallas won last year on penalty kicks at home in the second leg.

"We overcame a difficult result last year when we left this field," Pareja added. "This team has shown during the year that we can overcome difficult situations."

Despite the Sounders' big advantage, Schmetzer said his players are not getting ahead of themselves before the second leg in Texas.

"The talk after the game was, 'We're not done. We're not finished,'" Schmetzer said. "That message will be repeated throughout the week because Dallas is a very dangerous team. We're not taking anything for granted.

"If we come down there saying we've already won, then that will be a big mistake. We won't allow that to happen."

Valdez failed to score in the regular season, but he's stepped up in the playoffs in the absence of Clint Dempsey, scoring an 88th-minute winner in last week's knockout-round win over Sporting KC before finding the opener against Dallas.

"I just want to be thankful to the coach and the team for their trust in me," he said. "And the only way I could answer that trust was to score more goals and to continue to play the way I played tonight."

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