| In the interest of speed and timeliness, this story is fed directly from the Associated Press newswire and may contain spelling or grammatical errors. |
CARSON, Calif. (AP) The Los Angeles Galaxy have made the Major League Soccer playoffs for the eighth consecutive season, but their postseason stay will likely be short if they do not improve offensively.
The Galaxy lost to the Kansas City Wizards, 2-1, Saturday night, and have scored just three times in their last four games, posting a 1-3 record during that span.
``We've got to be more dangerous around the goal,'' midfielder Chris Albright said. ``It falls on my shoulders, not just the forwards' shoulders. It falls on the midfielders as well. We've got to be able to get more than one goal.''
Los Angeles played without forward Carlos Ruiz, the league's leading goal scorer, who was serving a one-game suspension after the yellow card he received in last Saturday's 1-0 overtime victory over D.C. United pushed him over the league's caution point limit.
Ruiz had scored 14 of the Galaxy's 29 goals entering Saturday's play.
``When you have a gentlemen missing who has half of your goals, obviously some other folks have to step up, and that's a burden,'' Kansas City coach Bob Gansler said.
Chris Klein scored twice, including the go-ahead goal in the 81st minute, as the Wizards ended a nine-game winless streak, winning for the first time since July 19.
``We haven't been a God awful team, but we haven't been good enough to win, and tonight we were,'' said Gansler, whose team was 0-7-2 during the streak, including losses in its last four games. ``It's a matter of the guys to keep the faith, to believe in ourselves as individuals and believe in us collectively and we did that. And you need a little bit of good fortune.''
Kansas City (8-10-8) got that good fortune in the 40th minute when Stephen Armstrong's cross deflected off Albright to Klein, who tucked a shot under onrushing Los Angeles goalkeeper Kevin Hartman for the tying goal.
``Klein and (Galaxy midfielder) Simon (Elliott) were in the way so I couldn't get a good angle on it to head it out,'' Albright said.
On the tie-breaking goal, Klein took a pass from Preki and put a shot from about 18 yards out past Hartman and inside the right goalpost for his fourth goal of the season.
Los Angeles (8-10-8) opened the scoring in the fifth minute when Alejandro Moreno headed a cross from Diego Serna past Kansas City goalkeeper Tony Meola for his third goal of the season before a crowd at The Home Depot Center announced at 23,637.
It was the fastest the Galaxy had scored from the start of a game and only the second time this season they had scored during the opening 15 minutes of play.
Both teams were assured playoff berths when Dallas lost at San Jose, 5-2. With the Burn's elimination, the Galaxy are the only team to qualify for the playoffs in all eight MLS seasons.
The Wizards led 10-8 in shots and 7-6 in shots on goal. Meola and Hartman both made five saves.
The three points for the victory moved Kansas City into a tie for third with Los Angeles in the five-team Western Conference with 32 points. Both teams have four games remaining.
The victory was the Wizards' first on the West Coast since a 3-0 victory at San Jose Aug. 16, 2000. Kansas City had been 0-8-3 at San Jose and Los Angeles since.