Timbers lose twice but clinch Commissioner's Cup

• by Paul Kennedy  @pkedit, Sep 14, 2009

[USL-1] Despite losing to the bottom two teams at home, Austin and Cleveland, in the space of three days, the Portland Timbers clinched the USL First Division regular-season title.

Puerto Rico was the last team with a chance to catch the Timbers but fell at Carolina, 2-1, on Saturday.

As the Commissioner's Cup winner, the Timbers will enter the USL-1 playoffs as the No. 1 seed and receive a bye to the semifinals slated for Oct. 1-4. All other playoff entrants have been set: Carolina, Puerto Rico, Charleston, Montreal, Rochester and
Vancouver.

While the second-place RailHawks and the fourth-place Charleston Battery can still reach 55 points by winning their remaining regular-season matches, the Timbers hold the advantage in the three-way tiebreaker should they all finish even in points, as well as the head-to-head tiebreaker over both clubs should one of the two catch them.

The 9,157 on hand Sunday helped the Timbers set a new modern-franchise record for regular-season attendance. In 14 regular-season home matches, the Timbers have seen 133,438 fans at PGE Park, topping the previous mark of 128,509 set in 2008. Portland, which will move to MLS in 2011, has one home match remaining on its regular-season schedule.

Results:
Sept. 7
Austin 0 Portland 1
Att.: 2,439
Goal:
POR: Stephen Keel 85

Sept. 8
Miami FC 1 Rochester 2
Att.: 460
Goals:
ROC: Johnny Menyongar (Ze Roberto) 31
MIA: Arron King (Jack Traynor) 71
ROC: Johnny Menyongar (Leslie Fitzpatrick) 77

Puerto Rico 2 Carolina 0
Att.: 2,053
Goals:
PR: Cristian Arrieta (penalty) 74
PR: John Krause (Jonathan Steele) 80

Sept. 9
Montreal 1 Vancouver 0
Att.: 11,867
Goals:
MON: Peter Byers (Leighton O'Brien) 90

Sept. 10
Minnesota 5 Puerto Rico 2
Att.: 2,143
Goals:
MIN: Marco Terminesi (Rod Dyachenko) 4
MIN: Kevin Friedland (Ricardo Sanchez) 37
PR: Fabrice Noel (Martin Nunez) 43
MIN: Rod Dyachenko 45
PR: Josh Hansen (penalty) 54
MIN: Ricardo Sanchez (penalty) 57
MIN: Brian Cvilikas (Jeremiah Bass) 88

Sept. 11
Charleston 2 Miami FC 1
Att.: 4,870
Goals:
CHA: Darren Spicer (Randi Patterson) 30
MIA: Aaron King (Bryan Shriver) 73
CHA: Scott Buete 90

Portland 1 Austin 2
Att.: 10,141
Goals:
POR: Own goal (David Horst) 29
AUS: Ryan McMahen 66
AUS: Lyle Adams (Michael Callahan) 82

Sept. 12
Carolina 2 Puerto Rico 1
Att.: 3350
Goals:
CAR: Gregory Richardson (Joseph Kabwe) 2
CAR: Andriy Budnyy (Gregory Richardson) 11
PR: Nicholas Addlery 66

Sept. 13
Rochester 0 Miami FC 0
Att.: : 6,381
Ejections
MIA: Nelson Pizzaro 90

Montreal 1 Minnesota 1
Att.: 12,805
Goals:
MIN: Marco Terminesi (Nathan Knox) 6
MON: Peter Byers (Roberto Brown) 85
Red Card:
MON: Peter Byers 90

Vancouver 2 Austin 1
Att.: 5,288
Goals:
AUS: Jarius Holmes (Kyle Brown) 51
VAN: Marcus Haber (Gordon Chin) 80
VAN: Gordon Chin (Lyle Martin) 86
Red Card:
AUS: Gifton Noel-Williams 77

Portland 0 Cleveland 1
Att.: 9,157
Goal:
CLE: Jason Hotchkin 24
Red Card:
CLE: Anthony Peters 90

Standings:
TEAM W L T GF GA P
Portland 15 5 10 43 19 55
Carolina 15 7 7 41 19 52
Puerto Rico 14 7 8 41 30 50
Charleston 13 5 10 30 19 49
Montreal 12 10 7 32 29 43
Rochester 11 9 9 34 32  42
Vancouver 10 10 9 40 35 39
-----------------------------------
Minnesota 7 12 10 37 41 31
Miami FC 8 16 5 25 49 29
Cleveland 5 17 7 21 48 22
Austin (-2) 5 17 8 28 51 21

Leading Scorers:
11 Gbeke, Vancouver
11 Menyongar, Rochester
11 Keita, Portland
10 Pore, Portland
10 Arrieta, Puerto Rico
8  James, Vancouver