Surprise Goaltenders Make Big Impacts On Playoffs' 1st Round

On a night when a backup keeper ties a franchise record for saves in a single game, there’s not much else you can do than to tip your cap. Either way, the Colorado Rapids are winless in their last three games, giving up 11 goals in that span. Three of them came against Houston Wednesday night, the Dynamo securing a 3-1 win at home against a Rapids team which has been up and down the past month. Via a career performance by Dynamo backup keeper Andrew Tarbell, who amassed 10 saves on the night, Houston won its second game in its last eight tries. Defensively, the Rapids will be left scratching their heads at the amount of goals allowed in the past few weeks, with a bottom five goals against figure of 29 in just 16 games so far this season. The icing on the cake was an 80th minute strike from outside the box by Sebastian Kowalczyk, spurred by a counterattack and assisted by Ibrahim Aliyu.

The Rockies’ May resurgence rests on their starting pitching, and Ty Blach has been central to the revival. The Denver native began the season at Triple-A Albuquerque, got called up as a reliever, and was inserted into the starting rotation out of necessity. Now he’s pitching like he should have been in there all along. Wednesday night, the veteran left-hander pitched seven solid innings, setting the table for Colorado’s 7-4 win over Cleveland at Coors Field in front of an announced crowd of 21,374. “You can’t control so many things in this game,” Blach said when asked about his trip from the minors to the majors this season.

Sports found Vic Lombardi. And he has spent his adult life finding ways to make it more fun and interesting for the rest of us. The son of Italian immigrants Ezio and Bambina, Lombardi did not speak English until around the age of 7. He remembers watching neighborhood kids play football, not knowing the rules, but joining the game anyway. “It was my way to assimilate into the culture.

Colorado Rapids midfielder Cole Bassett could be headed to Paris this summer. U. S. Soccer announced 25 players Wednesday morning who are being called up to represent the U. S. in an international friendly against Japan on June 11. The match will be held at Children’s Mercy Park in Kansas City. Bassett, who has been playing the best soccer of his career dating back to the final eight games of last season, was the only Rapids player to be selected.

By DYLAN LOVAN (Associated Press) LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Criminal charges against Scottie Scheffler have been dismissed, ending a legal saga that began with images of the world’s top golfer being arrested and handcuffed in Louisville during the PGA Championship. Jefferson County Attorney Mike O’Connell asked a judge Wednesday afternoon to drop the four charges against Scheffler, who was not required to be in the courtroom.

Fans will get one more training camp on the grass berm at the newly named Broncos Park Powered by CommonSpirit. Construction work on the team’s new headquarters and training facility is now set to begin after the preseason wraps up, Broncos president Damani Leech told The Denver Post. As a result, fans can expect a familiar training camp experience one last time later this summer, a change from the expectation when this project was first announced in November. “It’s really, really exciting,” Leech said.