In my third installment of highlighting that there was soccer in Portland before 2011, we look back to October, 2010, when the Timbers were in their final season, and due to needing to start work on renovations to Providence Park (then PGE Park), the Timbers were forced to go to Merlo Field at the University of Portland for their playoffs against the Vancouver Whitecaps. This was the only time in the Timbers USL era (2001-2010) that the Timbers played a match that “counted” (regular season, US Open Cup, playoffs) away from PGE Park.
After dropping the opener 2-0 in Vancouver, the Timbers knew how difficult their task would be as the 2010 Whitecaps had a notorious reputation for stalling and packing it in, and the Timbers would control play for much of the night, and would pull to within a goal on aggregate when James Marcelin scored on a header in the 49th minute. But despite a barrage of shots on the Whitecaps goal, the Timbers would never find the series equalizer and the Timbers USL era ended with a 1-0 win, but a 2-1 aggregate playoff loss.
