SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) Jeff Agoos was sure it wouldn't be the
last time he presented a game ball to Landon Donovan.
Donovan, the 19-year-old striker from the U.S. National Team,
scored his first Major League Soccer goal as the San Jose
Earthquakes snapped the New York/New Jersey MetroStars' five-game
winning streak with a 2-0 victory Saturday.
"He's going to be as good as he wants to be," said Agoos, the
Earthquakes' captain and Donovan's teammate on the national team.
"We gave him the game ball because it was his first goal, but
he'll do more than that really soon. We play with him every day,
and we know what he can do."
Using his trademark blazing speed, Donovan scored in the 83rd
minute as San Jose (4-2-1), MLS' worst team last season, continued
its surprising early-season run with a victory over the Eastern
Conference's top team.
While Wade Barrett's first goal of the season put San Jose ahead
in the first half, Joe Cannon's stellar goaltending and a steady
offensive attack led San Jose to its third straight win.
Donovan and Ronald Cerritos had several decent chances
throughout the game before Donovan -- in what was likely his best
game since joining MLS from Bayer Leverkusen of the German
Bundesliga -- slipped behind the defense, took a pass from Richard
Mulroney and easily beat goalie Tim Howard.
"It was a good time for my first goal," Donovan said. "I
thought they were getting a little more dangerous there at the end,
so it was good to put it away. It wasn't easy to break them down in
the back, but Rich played a ball right into my path, and it was
easy from there."
San Jose generally had its way with the MetroStars, who looked
fatigued while playing their third game in seven days under a hot
California sun.
San Jose scored first in the 26th minute when Manny Lagos threw
a beautiful back-heel pass to defender Barrett, who fired a shot
into the far corner of the net. The goal snapped Howard's personal
string of 243 scoreless minutes.
"Maybe being on the East Coast for so long and coming to this
type of weather just drained us," MetroStars coach Octavio
Zambrano said. "We were slow. We had a few great opportunities to
tie the match, and we didn't."
Cannon made his best save in the 68th minute, when he blocked a
point-blank shot by Alex Comas and then ripped the ball away from
Comas' feet in the box. Comas lay on the ground with his head in
his hands after the sequence.
New York/New Jersey had few scoring chances as the Earthquakes'
defense, led by Agoos, was strong again. Clint Mathis, another
national team star and MLS' leading scorer, was shut down.
"We didn't do anything special to get him out of the game,"
San Jose coach Frank Yallop said of Mathis. "We just played a
solid match, and he couldn't get free."
The MetroStars, who will head home to New Jersey for two days
before a match at Kansas City on Thursday, opened a four-game road
trip after going 5-1 on a six-game homestand. New York/New Jersey
hasn't scored on San Jose in 336 consecutive minutes, a streak
dating back to 1999.