PORTLAND, Ore. – It was only a quarter-hour after the loss, the Portland Timbers’ first at Providence Park this season, that Sebastián Blanco remembered: The team had put itself in that situation, before.
Perhaps those previous spots weren’t as drastic as the two-goal deficit Portland carried into Saturday’s halftime – one which preceded the team’s 2-1 loss to Vancouver Whitecaps FC – but, according to Blanco, the team had endured poor stretches in their three previous wins, too. Yet whereas games against the Montréal Impact, Houston Dynamo and Philadelphia Union produced seven points, the final game of the team’s four-game home stretch produced none.