Houston Dynamo lost at home for the first time in club history Saturday night, the Kansas City Wizards remaining undefeated on the season with a dramatic 2-1 victory at Robertson Stadium.
Just when it seemed as Dynamo would survive the final 12 minutes playing a man down, left back Jose Burciaga Jr. came forward to hit the game-winner and silence a stadium which despite the draw to that point was still vibrating with emotion.
Both teams had clear chances in the opening 45 minutes, with each goalkeeper called upon to save their sides. But while it was Dynamo which had the better opportunities, the Wizards had the best early chance. Josh Wolff centered the ball from the right finding the unmarked Burciaga, but his powerful shot was deflected wide by Onstad's right foot.
Three minutes later Dynamo once again put a flowing sequence together out of midfield, just as they had on numerous occasions in their season-opening 5-2 win against Colorado. Starting at the feet of Ricardo Clark, who had broken up a Wizards move, he found Dwayne De Rosario who sent a perfect cross into the area. But Brian Mullan couldn't take advantage, and the score remained tied.
Then in the 37th minute Houston central defender Kevin Goldthwaite found Brian Ching with a free kick, only to see his header come back off the left post of the goal defended by Bo Oshoniyi.
After the break, Dynamo started the brighter and nearly opened the scoring twice early on. First Alejandro Moreno saw his header sail over the goal. In the 48th minute, a Mullan to Ching pass saw the resulting header miss wide left. In the 52nd minute, the Dynamo were denied again as Mullan's shot was grabbed by Oshoniyi.
The home side finally broke through in the 64th minute. Goldthwaite again put in a free kick and Ching again connected, this time heading past Oshoniyi to put Dynamo into the lead and the Robertson Stadium crowd into rapture.
But the excitement didn't last long. The Wizards won a corner, Burciaga put it into the area and Sasha Victorine rose up to head home past Onstad for the 66th-minute equalizer.
With 15 minutes to go, Dynamo seemed to have pulled ahead when Wade Barrett shot past Oshoniyi, but the goal was correctly ruled out for offside.
Then two minutes later the match turned upside down, as De Rosario was sent off with a straight red card for a hard tackle on Burciaga's ankle.
It was that same player who sent Dynamo to their first defeat while keeping the Wizards unbeaten on the campaign. Just before the clock was to turn over the full 90 minutes, Burciaga grabbed the ball and let fly with a formidable blast from his feared left foot that didn't give Onstad a chance to stop and send Houston to defeat in just their second match in their new home.
Carlos Mojica is a contributor to MLSnet.com. Ignacio Salazar contributed to this report. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
