What Decision Day means for the Vancouver Whitecaps

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Vanni Sartini has been through rough patches with the Vancouver Whitecaps before. The 1-6-1 and 0-2-3 starts to the past two seasons come to mind, or the late-season swoon of 2022 that ultimately cost them a playoff spot.

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But the current six-game winless skid, including three straight losses after last Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to LAFC, holds a special, painful spot in his heart.

“It’s the most heavy (moment) that I went through since I’ve been coaching the Whitecaps,” the Caps’ normally ebullient coach said on Wednesday.

Vancouver has one win since the start of September — a 2-0 home shutout of the San Jose Earthquakes, owners of the league’s worst record — and five goals in the other seven games. The loss to LA last weekend was the twisting of a knife made of salt. An undermanned team missing all three Designated Players and four other starters overcame a first-minute goal, played the conference powerhouse to a standstill, before losing in injury time.

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After the game, Sartini was mentally destroyed that his club squandered a gutsy and controlling performance. He was frustrated over what he felt was a missed foul call in the buildup to the winning goal — an “injustice.” And there was his personal chagrin, a millstone of guilt hanging from his neck, for the yellow card he received, meaning he won’t be on the sidelines for the Decision Day road game against Real Salt Lake.

“I don’t know what it is. Bad luck or whatever you want to call it,” Sartini said at the time.

“We shouldn’t have lost and I’m incredibly disappointed. If you ask me now, I don’t want to be a coach anymore in my life.”

Three days on, he’s back on stable ground, looking ahead to the final day of the regular season, which will ironically end as it started: with Mike D’Agostino acting as head coach.

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“You know, knock on wood, Mike has very good record away: two games, two wins,” Sartini said. “We always say there’s no two without three, let’s make it three.”

HOW IT CAN FINISH

Vancouver can’t finish any higher than seventh place in the West. Here’s what you need to know for when they visit RSL on Saturday.

To finish seventh, and skip the play-in game with Portland … 

— The Whitecaps have to win and hope Minnesota United loses.

— They can still leapfrog the Loons if Minnesota ties, and Vancouver (+4) finishes with better goal differential (Min: +6). The first tiebreaker is wins, and they’d be tied 14-14.

If they’re tied on goal differential, the next tiebreakers are goals (currently 54-51 Min.) and disciplinary points.

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The latter scenario comes into play if Vancouver wins 3-1 and Minnesota ties 0-0; the Loons have 72 yellows and four reds, the Whitecaps 62/3.

To finish eighth, and host the play-in game with Portland … 

— The Whitecaps must win, and see Minnesota win.

— The Whitecaps must win and see Minnesota tie, but the Loons win the tiebreakers.

— Portland loses or draws.

To finish ninth, and travel to Portland for the play-in game … 

— Vancouver has to lose or tie, and Portland has to win.

CHANCES ARE

— Playoffstatus.com gives the Whitecaps a six per cent chance of finishing seventh. If they did, the likely Round 1 opponent would be LAFC, who have a 75 per cent chance of finishing second in the West.

— The reward for beating Portland in the play-in game would be a Round 1 best-of-three series with the LA Galaxy, who are currently in pole position in the West.

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GAMES OF IMPORTANCE

St. Louis at Minnesota

Minnesota, 5-1-1 in their last seven and unbeaten in four, host St. Louis on Decision Day (all Western games start at 6 p.m. PT). St. Louis has won three of four, and saw a brace from Simon Becher and an injury-time score from Jake Nerwinski to see off Houston 3-0 last game out.

“It’s not a secret that we’ll have an eye on the app. And if Minnesota is 3-0 at the end of the first half, maybe we’ll rest some players in the second half,” said Sartini. “(But) I think it’s pretty possible (Minnesota loses), because St Louis is doing really well lately. Hopefully Simon is going to remember he played for the Whitecaps and score a goal. Jake can keep them at zero and then Simon can score. That would be fantastic.”

Portland at Seattle 

The Sounders are locked into a top-4 spot, and can’t pass either LAFC or LAG for second. They’re tied on points with RSL, but currently hold the wins tiebreaker.

But the winner of this game will hoist the Cascadia Cup, so don’t expect either team to let up.

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