Columbus Crew tops LAFC to win MLS Cup with the exquisite soccer they trademarked all season

The Columbus Crew won their third MLS title with a masterclass in bold, proactive soccer.

They won it Saturday at home with two goals, the second of which epitomized their 2023 transformation.

They bossed and battered LAFC, the defending champ, with high pressure and exquisite passing, all of which rose to the surface as one in the 36th and 37th minutes of a 2-1 win in a fantastic final.

The Crew already led 1-0 on a somewhat fluky but deserved penalty. They then strung together 11 passes to double their lead and put one final stamp on a season that was, definitively, theirs.

Their revolution began 12 months ago, after a second consecutive season without playoffs. They hired French coach Wilfried Nancy away from CF Montreal, and handed him keys to a well-aligned club. Nancy, an ideologue in a sport often ruled by pragmatists, arrived with a bold vision for how the Crew would play, whether or not they won — he sometimes calls it “a way of life.”

That vision materialized over nine-plus months, and delivered a championship. It culminated Saturday in front of a boisterous crowd that has helped fuel the bravery and belief that Nancy’s “way of life” requires. And it culminated most of all late in the first half.

An aggressive press allowed homegrown midfielder Aidan Morris to cut out an LAFC pass in the attacking third. Patient possession then dragged all but two LAFC players to the far side of the field. A crisp pass into the feet of striker Cucho Hernandez pulled Jesús Murillo toward the ball, away from his position as LAFC’s right center back on the near side.

Two passes later, Malte Amundsen picked out the gap that Murillo had vacated. He broke two lines with one ingenious through-ball. And Yaw Yeboah put the visitors to bed before they could even get to the locker room for halftime, wobbling and wounded.

LAFC awoke periodically throughout the second half. It weathered the Columbus storm, then pulled a goal back with 16-plus minutes remaining. And it nearly exposed one flaw in the Crew’s brash approach, which often left them susceptible to blown leads and heartbreak throughout the regular season.

But not here.

Even with Denis Bouanga bearing down on them, with rain intensifying, and with nerves spiking, the Crew held on to win, 2-1. They initially pushed for a third goal; then they shut up shop, clung to their slender lead, took yellow cards when necessary, and became the third MLS franchise to claim three or more titles.

“We played our way,” an emotional Nancy marveled postgame. “I’m so proud.”

Fireworks spouted from the top of Lower.com Field at the final whistle. A city exploded with joy that, six years ago, threatened to depart for good. For months in 2017 and 2018, Crew fans thought that their beloved team was moving to Austin, Texas; that a day like Saturday would become impossible.

Then-owner Anthony Precourt, MLS commissioner Don Garber and many others tried to make it so. They pulled with all their might, trying to snatch an MLS original away from its community.

But fans fought back. They and the Haslam family kept the club in Ohio. And they refurbished it into a born-again contender.

The Crew won a COVID-stained title in 2020. Then they sunk back out of the playoffs, so they parted ways with head coach Caleb Porter and paid a transfer fee for Nancy, their star offseason signing. Nancy spent the coming weeks and months reteaching players and purging well-drilled habits. He asked them to invite pressure onto themselves, to hold the ball rather than quickly ping it. Sometimes, he knew, they’d lose it and put their teammates in peril; he wanted them to accept the potential embarrassment.

He asked for their trust and courage, because all of this, he knew, would manipulate opponents and produce splendid soccer. It could remake a mediocre team into a prolific one. It could invigorate fans and guide Columbus back to the top of Major League Soccer.

And that’s precisely what it did.

The Crew led MLS in goals, chance creation, possession and entertainment throughout 2023. They hunted the ball, and passed it perilously, baiting opponents out of position. Sometimes they knew they’d look silly. They’d turn the ball over. They’d leave themselves exposed. They did both of those things in last Saturday’s Eastern Conference Final in Cincinnati.

But they dug themselves out of a 2-0 hole. They won 3-2 that night, and seven days later, they simply kept rising.

They rose because they believed in Nancy’s vision. They believed that they could play like no other MLS team had ever played, that they might even be able to revolutionize the league.

They believed because Nancy inspired them. Because he convinced them long ago that faith would bring triumphs, and that, as he said immediately after Saturday’s victory: “Impossible is an opinion.”