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Sporting KC earns three points in Colorado

Thommy, Joveljic and Pulskamp lead SKC to victory at the Rapids

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1 week ago

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Fireworks | Credit: Thad Bell

Sporting Kansas City has not won in Colorado for over a decade (March 2014) but two goals early in each half have np erased that statistic. Dejan Joveljic and Erik Thommy scored before a strong Colorado Rapids side could finally get one back. The Colorado Rapids outshot Sporting KC 25-5 but struggled to overcome the Sporting KC defense. The Rapids had a 4.6 XG compared to Kansas City’s 1.1.

Interim manager Kerry Zavagnin brought Joveljic back into the lineup after he was left on the bench in the last match. Joaquin Fernandez also returned to the lineup after missing the previous match for a yellow card accumulation suspension. Zorhan Bassong returned from his time with Canada at the Gold Cup and slotted back into the midfield.

Sporting Kansas City started on the front foot with some energy, and it paid off quickly. In the 4th minute, Colorado’s Chidozie Awaziem played a ball back to Nico Hanson. The young Rapid’s keeper was pressured by Dejon Joveljic and did not play the next pass as cleanly as he wanted. Sporting KC winger Erik Thommy quickly pounced on the pass and got his head up as Joveljic positioned himself into a shooting position. Thommy picked out the DP striker who easily one-touched it to the back of the Colorado net, giving Sporting KC an early lead. Joveljic’s goal was his 12th of the 2025 season and he now has a goal or assist in seven straight matches. 

Colorado took control of the match after the early SKC goal and started pressuring the visitors. Sporting KC keeper John Pulskamp came up big numerous times, including several brave efforts coming out for the ball. In this case, he came out to punch the ball and was rewarded with a cleat to the head.

In the 29th minute , Pulskamp redirected a shot to his right, but it was not out of danger. Djordje Mihailovic chased the ball down as Pulskamp attempted to knock it away. Pulskamp caught the Colorado attacker’s feet and a penalty was awarded. Mihailovic’s attempt went off the post to save Puslamp and Sporting KC.

Despite the Colorado pressure, the game went into halftime with Sporting KC still up 1-0. Zavagnin took Fernandez off and brought in 17-year-old Ian James. Fernandez had picked up another early yellow and SKC’s coaching staff wanted to limit the chance for a second yellow. James made his first start with the first team last weak when Fernandez was out on a card accumulation suspension.

Sporting KC struck early in the second half as well. Pulskamp launched the ball down the field to Erik Thommy. The German attacker took care of the rest, slicing through the Colorado defense before sliding a shot into the goal in the 53rd minute.

Resident KC Soccer Journal statistics guru noted that Pulskamp not only tied SKC Legend Tony Meola for number of assists, he is also the first SKC keeper to get multiple in a season.

Colorado kept the pressure up and took advantage of the youth and inexperience of the SKC Homegrown defender Ian James. Darren Yapi made his move and James was late to the tackle and thus Colorado earned another penalty.

Navarro stutter-stepped, twinkle-toed, and momentarily paused before putting the attempt past Pulskamp in the 89th minute.

Sporting KC fought hard to preserve the lead and earn that first win in Colorado since 2014.

With the three points, SKC moves into 10th in the Western Conference, just one place behind the play-in game. Other teams around them in the standings have some games in hand, but it is a definite improvement in position and results.

Sporting Kansas City: John Pulskamp; Khiry Shelton, Jansen Miller, Joaquin Fernandez (Ian James 46′), Tim Leibold )Memo Rodriguez 57′); Jacob Bartlett, Zorhan Bassong, Manu Garcia; Erik Thommy (C) (Santiago Munoz 87′), Dejan Joveljic (Mason Toye 73′), Shapi Suleymanov (Daniel Salloi 58′)

Subs Not Used: Ryan Schewe, Andrew Brody, Stephen Afrifa

Colorado Rapids: Nico Hansen; Keegan Rosenberry (C), Andreas Maxso, Chidozie Awaziem, Jackson Travis; Josh Atencio (Darren Yapi 73′), Connor Ronan, Calvin Harris (Kimani Stewart-Baynes 81′), Ted Ku-DiPietro (Cole Bassett 60′), Djordje Mihailovic; Rafael Navarro

Subs Not Used: Oliver Larraz, Wayne Frederick, Sam Bassett, Ian Murphy, Adam Beaudry, Kevin Cabral

Scoring Summary:
SKC – Dejan Joveljic 12 (Erik Thommy 4) 4′
SKC – Erik Thommy 4 (John Pulskamp 2) 53′
COL – Rafael Navarro 7 (penalty kick) 89′

Misconduct Summary:
SKC — Joaquin Fernandez (yellow card; unsporting behavior) 17′
SKC — Manu Garcia (yellow card; unsporting behavior) 48′
SKC — Tim Leibold (yellow card; unsporting behavior) 52′
SKC — Jacob Bartlett (yellow card; unsporting behavior) 64′

STAT SKC COL
Shots 5 25
Shots on Goal 2 9
Saves 8 0
Fouls 15 7
Offsides 0 1
Corner Kicks 2 10

Referee: Filip Dujic
Assistant Referee: Adam Wienckowski
Assistant Referee: Felisha Mariscal
Fourth Official: Trevor Wiseman
VAR: Edvin Jurisevic
AVAR: Mike Kampmeinert

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KCOutsider

Just watched the MLS highlights of this one. Really nice to see Pulskamp continue to grow into the role.

Also, those announcers seemed particularly bad even by MLS standards (where I’ve normally watched in Spanish the last few years to avoid the terrible English ones). Praising the incredible atmosphere at a clearly not-full Dick’s? Claiming Thommy is among the best players in MLS since his arrival? I really like Thommy but that’s ludicrous.

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dal90

i mean in terms of offensive skill he’s up there

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InToTouch

I thought the woman doing the play-by-play was alright but the guy with the commentary was really bad

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ar_jhawk

Was at the game. It was announced a sell-out (which we know is tickets sold, not butts in seats), but those Rapids douches were admittedly pretty loud. I honestly don’t know if there is history, but they typically pick out one opposing player and boo him all game. They decided on Thommy and kept at all 90. Made the second goal sweeter too. For some unfathomable reason I was the only one in my section who cheered when he hit it.

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KCOutsider

I went back and rewatched that clip to be sure my memory was correct. Here’s the announcer: “The atmosphere, as always, remarkable…we are underway…”

So that’s said as the opening kickoff happens, when the camera is clearly showing half-empty stands and I can even hear boots hitting the ball.

Maybe the atmosphere was great later, maybe people were late getting to their seats, fine. But there’s nothing resembling a “remarkable atmosphere” that the TV viewer is being shown, and “as always” is laughable given how much Colorado has struggled with attendance at times.

Just one of many examples of laughable fluffing from the commenters during even the 7 minutes of highlights I watched.

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ar_jhawk

Yeah, they do a huge fireworks show after (two straight years with SKC as the opponent) and a fanfest before with food vendors and bouncy houses and climbing walls and stuff. So, it probably was late to fill. I think it was two season ago now, they were having fan revolts over ownership refusing to spend money (sound familiar). The crowds are back now that they have crawled at least halfway up the table. But always remarkable atmosphere is doing a lot of work.

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KCOutsider

Cool context. That’s a fun tradition. It just always baffles me how bad announcers feel the need to overstate things.

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ar_jhawk

I don’t know if it is just total coincidence that they have had a home game both the past 2 4ths and another coincidence that it has featured SKC, but, for now, I’m down with it being an annual thing…

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