RSL opens playoffs vs. champion Crew

If Real Salt Lake really is going to contend for the Major League Soccer championship, it's going to have to go through the best team in the league.

Not even a day after dramatically securing its second straight playoff berth, RSL learned Sunday it will open the playoffs against defending champion and top-seeded Columbus Crew at Rio Tinto Stadium next weekend. RSL was relegated to that position as the final wild-card playoff entrant, after the Crew lost their regular-season finale to New England.

Still, coach Jason Kreis said RSL has shown him "that we can win it all," if it plays as well as it did in its season-saving 3-0 victory over rival Colorado on Saturday night.

As the lowest seed in the playoffs, though,

RSL will not get the chance to host a conference championship game the way it did last year, no matter how badly it might beat the Crew to advance that far.

The winner of the two-game, first-round series -- the winner is determined by aggregate goals -- will play either New England or Chicago in the MLS Eastern Conference final, for the right to advance to the MLS Cup championship game Nov. 22 at Qwest Field in Seattle. Though it's a member of the Western Conference, RSL is playing in the Eastern Conference playoff bracket because that conference did not produce enough wild-card teams to fill it.

Led by midfielder Guillermo Barros Schelotto, the Crew finished atop the league standings with 49 points from a 13-7-10 record -- but scored only one goal in their last four games after setting a league record with a 24-game home unbeaten streak.

Schelotto was the league most valuable player last season, and was a role model for RSL's Javier Morales when the midfielder was growing up in Argentina.

RSL finished the regular season with 40 points from an 11-12-7 record, and split its season series with the Crew. It destroyed them 4-1 at home in April, but lost 3-1 at Crew Stadium in July. RSL has won only once in five games in Columbus.

mcl@sltrib.com