Real Salt Lake fell short of a 2013 MLS Cup championship by the width of a crossbar, falling to Sporting KC in the 10th round of a thrilling penalty-kick shootout after Lovel Palmer's spot kick clanged off the woodwork on a bone-chilling night in Kansas City.
A year later, things feel quite different as the offseason rolls in on the Wasatch Front.
Difficult questions lie ahead for the club that has become Major League Soccer's gold standard for consistent success with their "The Team is The Star" ethos. They've mastered measured financial management, savvy roster-building, faithful (and skilful) adherence to the 4-4-2 diamond and they've played a part in the past seven MLS Cup Playoffs, the longest such ongoing streak of any team in the league.
Which team will the series?
Sunday night's stunning 5-0 thumping at the hands of the LA Galaxy didn't just end Salt Lake's season in ignominious fashion. It exposed the limitations of coach Jeff Cassar's current squad, flaunted the big-market financial might that RSL have set themselves up in diametric opposition to and perhaps even raised doubts about the current brain trust's foundational principles.
“One thing we've got to be honest with ourselves about is, LA was clearly better than we were,” RSL general manager Garth Lagerwey told MLSsoccer.com this week. “That wasn't an aberration result – the worst loss since I've been here at RSL. To lose in the manner in which we lost, on a big stage like that, is disappointing.
“I think LA and Seattle were better than we were over the course of the season," added Lagerwey (below, right) and I can't recall ever saying that before in past seasons.”
Real have been amazingly consistent since their Cinderella run to the 2009 MLS Cup title, earning 15 wins or more and racking up between 53 and 57 points in every season that followed. But the league they influenced during that span has evolved again, and on Sunday that reality slapped them across the face.
Harried by LA's muscular pressing, outraced and out-thought by Galaxy superstars Landon Donovan and Robbie Keane and shockingly unable to get the ball down and weave the extended possession sequences we've come to expect, RSL walked away from Sunday's loss with precious little of the pride and serenity they carried home from that epic final in 2013.
“We came across a team in LA that was firing on all cylinders. And we didn't have our best night,” head coach Jeff Cassar told MLSsoccer.com as he returned to Utah after the loss. “They exposed us.
“Maybe against a different opponent we could've got away with it, but not on this night, not the way they played.”
For all their sustained excellence, RSL's superb core of veterans have grown long in the tooth, and there's still only one major trophy in the display case at Rio Tinto Stadium. Key defenders Nat Borchers and Chris Wingert are among four players out of contract as of Dec. 1 – they've appeared in 205 and 184 regular-season games since 2008, respectively, and both were part of the 2009 title run.
While the club have taken all the smart steps to groom the old guard's eventual replacements via their Arizona residential academy and a new USL PRO team set to debut next year, the awkward process of generational change hangs in the air like an unanswered door bell.
“I do think that we have to get a little bit younger and be willing to take some risks with our roster to try to get a little bit better,” said Lagerwey. “Because I think we had a very good team, and I think we've been very good for a long time, but we haven't won a title in five years.”
But one similarity from last winter may prove to be the most unsettling element around the club: Lagerwey, the prime architect of all that stability and success since his arrival in 2007, is out of contract and considering his options, much like head coach Jason Kreis did a year ago before departing for expansion side New York City FC.
It's not a perfect comparison, in large part because Lagerwey sounds genuinely unsure of what he'll do next, whereas Kreis' move was reported before RSL's 2013 run had even ended and was formally announced soon after. Lagerwey says he, club president Bill Manning and owner Dell Loy Hansen postponed his contract talks until after the season, and those discussions are expected to begin next week, even as reports have already linked Lagerwey to multiple suitors elsewhere.
“I don't. I don't,” Lagerwey said, almost apologetically, when asked if he knew what his future held. “It's something that we didn't want to deal with when the season was going on, and I still think that was the right approach. But I imagine now that those decisions will happen pretty quickly – well, I shouldn't say pretty quickly, but I think we'll at least sit down and begin to have those kind of conversations.
“We'll see what those guys want to do, and see if there's a role for me at RSL. We'll see what else is out there, and go from there.”
Cassar says “the best move for the club is to have [Lagerwey] here for a very, very long time,” but acknowledges that his close friend and longtime colleague is “going to have to do what he feels is the best move for himself and his family and his career.”
And he points out that plenty of other changes will likely be imposed on the club by outside circumstances, including the MLS Expansion Draft. Lagerwey told media members on Wednesday that he expects RSL players to be selected in the top two spots when New York City FC and Orlando City make their picks, making the team's list of protected players that much more important when it's submitted to the league office next month.
“There's so many things that are up in the air right now with the collective bargaining agreement – what's the salary cap going to be? What's our roster size going to be?" said Cassar (right). “Having Garth there is hugely important for that.”
For his part, Lagerwey said Wednesday that a big-dollar offer won't necessarily lure him away from RSL, but a bigger opportunity – much like the one Kreis craved when the took over at NYCFC – just might.
"It's opportunity. It's career. It's what puts me on the best path going forward, understanding that, in a lot of ways, there are a lot of positives here," Lagerwey said.
If he elects to stay, however, Lagerwey sounds uninterested in maintaining the status quo in Utah for another year. The team's "Moneyball" model can still work, he insists, but they'll need another generation of star players coming through the ranks in Arizona to keep up with the rest of the league.
“The academy is really crucial to our future – the only way we can compete long-term with the LAs, the Seattles, is to push kids through from the academy, to grow our own talent and hope that the group, the body, is better than just a star here or there, like some of the bigger teams," he said. "We've got to try to make difference-making players come out of our system, and that will be one of the big focuses over the next couple of years.”
RSL signed 27-year-old Designated Player and Argentine striker Sebastian Jaime over the summer, and a raft of young talent led by Luis Gil, Joao Plata and Sebastian Velasquez may just be ready to take the reins sooner than later. Cassar, an MLS lifer deeply inculcated in the RSL way, looks to have major upside as he masters the job.
“I think the future is bright for us. We have all the pieces here to be successful now and in the future, which is a credit to our ownership, and Garth and Bill,” said Cassar. “But there's lots of room for improvement. I need to get better, and I will – I made some good choices and some bad choices, but you have to go through that experience to get better.
“And I promised the guys in the locker room that in this offseason I will do everything I can to become a better coach, and to help them and the club for years to come.”
But only time will tell whether Lagerwey finds keeping RSL on top as inspiring as getting them there in the first place.
MLSsoccer.com reporter Scott Pierce contributed to this report.
