COLUMBUS, Ohio - Columbus Crew SC are officially in the midst of only their second win streak of the season.
Though they sit in second place in the Eastern Conference standings, Columbus haven't put more than two wins together in a row all season, notching back-to-back wins April 18 and 25 before embarking on a largely inconsistent summer campaign.
But the club won consecutive matches against rival Chicago Fire this week, with a 1-0 win Wednesday in Bridgeview and a 3-1 win to cap off the week in Columbus.
Could it be the beginning of a longer streak for the club? Defender Tyson Wahl hopes the pair of wins can be a turning point.
"I think it shows a lot of great character and grittiness," he said after the match. "I think over the last two years we've shown that we can be a great team, but we haven't always been consistent. So I think it shows, with two sound wins in a row, that maybe we're on our way to becoming a more consistent team. I think that's the next step in our development."
Newly crowned MLS All-Star Kei Kamara scored in both wins, but isn't happy with just two in a row.
"I wouldn't call that a win streak," he said with a laugh. "But it was really, really good for us to get an away win and get that off of our backs, and when we play at home we want nothing less than three points. So if it's a win streak, and we definitely have to keep pushing it to our next game against Toronto."
Playing their third match in nine days in a sticky, hot afternoon in Columbus, head coach Gregg Berhalter said his team overcame some difficult conditions to come up with the wins.
"In this game, I think the players did extremely well mentally to get over the hump and get a result," he said. "It wasn't easy. You saw today, it clearly was not our best game of soccer. You can lose games like that; you can tie games like that. I give the guys a lot of credit for hanging in there and finding a way to get it done. It wasn't easy. Chicago made it tough on us."
Kamara agreed.
"It wasn't our best," he said. "At some point I even forgot we were a man up because I felt like Chicago was controlling the game a lot. But it's really good for us to come out of there with three points and multiple goals. Being at home, we have to take three points from those games. Doing it twice against Chicago back-to-back is definitely good for us."
The club will look to make it three in a row as they host Toronto FC next Saturday, and Wahl says they won't be resting on their laurels.
"This isn't good enough," he said. "We're not going to get complacent. We know we can play better, and this is the right time to get a couple wins in a row and build momentum for the end of the season."
