Galaxy Clinch Top Seed in the Western Conference with 2-0 Win Over San Jose

LA Galaxy 2, San Jose Earthquakes 0
Saturday, October 24, 2009
The Home Depot Center — Carson, Calif.

Scoring Summary:
LA – Own Goal (Bobby Burling) 24’
LA – Landon Donovan 12 (Chris Klein 3) 77’

Misconduct Summary:
SJ— Bobby Convey (Yellow Card) 17’
SJ – Arturo Alvarez (Yellow Card) 69’
LA – Omar Gonzalez (Yellow Card) 78’

Lineups:
LA Galaxy: Donovan Ricketts, Todd Dunivant, Gregg Berhalter, Omar Gonzalez, Sean Franklin, Dema Kovalenko, Landon Donovan© David Beckham (Jovan Kirovski 86’), Chris Birchall (Chris Klein 76’), Mike Magee (Eddie Lewis 66’), Edson Buddle.

Subs Not Used: Josh Saunders, Yohance Marshall, A.J. DeLaGarza, Bryan Jordan

San Jose Earthquakes: Joe Cannon, Ramiro Corrales©, Bobby Burling, Brandon McDonald, Chris Leitch, Simon Elliott, Bobby Convey, Ramon Sanchez, Shea Salinas (Quincy Amarikwa 66’), Arturo Alvarez, Ryan Johnson.

Subs Not Used: Andrew Weber, Aaron Pitchkolan, Michael Zaher, Jamil Roberts, Antonio Ribeiro.

Notes:
• With the win, the Galaxy finish the season with a 12-6-12 record, giving them 48 points. LA finishes the season atop the Western Conference and will be the #1 seed in the conference heading into the Western Conference Semifinals, which start next week. They will now face either Chivas USA or Houston in the Western Conference Semifinal Series.
• This is the first time since the 2002 season that the Galaxy finished the regular season atop the Western Conference. They also accomplished the feat in 1996, 1998, 1999 and 2001.
• Bruce Arena made one change to the team that drew 0-0 on Sunday at Houston. Eddie Lewis, who started that game as the Galaxy captain, began the game on the bench and was replaced in the starting lineup by Landon Donovan, who again wore the captain’s armband today.
• The Galaxy were without Alecko Eskandarian, Stefani Miglioranzi and Julian Valentin, who all missed the game through injury.
• The own goal by Bobby Burling in the 24th minute gave the Galaxy a 1-0 lead. That was the second own goal of the season scored for LA, with the other coming in the first half of the 6-3 loss to FC Dallas on September 12.
• Landon Donovan added the Galaxy’s second goal for his team-best 12th of the season. This is the fourth time in his MLS career that he scored exactly 12 goals, also doing so in 2003 with San Jose, and 2005 and 2006 with the Galaxy. Donovan helped lead his team to an MLS Cup title each of the first two times that he scored 12 goals.
• Chris Klein assisted on Donovan’s second half goal for his third assist of the season. All three of those have come on Landon Donovan goals, with the last two each coming in Galaxy home victories.
• The Galaxy scored the game’s first goal and finish the season with a 12-0-1 record when scoring the game’s opening goal.
• Donovan Ricketts made two saves to record his ninth clean sheet of the season and 10th victory. He is the first Galaxy goalkeeper to record 10 wins in a season since Kevin Hartman did so in 2006 and his nine shutouts are the most since Hartman set a team record with 11 in 1999.
• The clean sheet tonight was the Galaxy’s 12th of the season, setting a new club record. Ricketts had nine of those shutouts, while Josh Saunders had two and the duo combined for one other. In 2008, LA set a club record for fewest shutouts in a season with two, both of which came against San Jose.
• This was the second time that the Galaxy have faced San Jose at The Home Depot Center since their return to MLS last year. Both of those games have ended 2-0 in favor of the Galaxy with Landon Donovan scoring the second goal in each.
• After allowing an MLS-worst 62 goals in 2008, LA allowed exactly half that number, 31, this season. The Galaxy's 31-goal defensive improvement is the best in MLS hitsory, breaking the former mark of 30 goals, which was set by the Colorado Rapids who allowed 69 goals in 1998 and 39 goals in 1999.
• The Galaxy have now kept a clean sheet in each of their last three games. This was the third different time this season that LA kept a clean sheet in three straight games.
• This was the first time since August 29 and September 12 that the Galaxy used the same starting back four as the previous match.
• Bruce Arena used all three of his available substitutes in the game. LA made three changes in all 30 of their regular season games this season.
• The attendance for today’s game was a sellout crowd of 27,000. This was the Galaxy’s second home sellout of the regular season.
• Following the game, the Galaxy handed out their annual team awards, with Landon Donovan winning the club’s MVP and Budweiser Golden Boot award as the team’s top scorer, Donovan Ricketts winning the team’s Defender of the Year award and Todd Dunivant claiming the U.S. Soccer Foundation Humanitarian of the Year award.
• The date and opponent of the first leg of the Galaxy’s Western Conference Semifinal Series is yet to be determined, but the Galaxy’s home leg will be played on Sunday, November 8 at The Home Depot Center, kicking off at 4:30 p.m.
• For more about tonight’s game, please visit www.lagalaxy.com.