On Saturday, Clint Dempsey recorded the fifth hat trick in Sounders FC history when he scored three to help Seattle to a 4-4 draw with the Portland Timbers at Providence Park. That feat earned him a spot on the MLSsoccer.com Team of the Week, making him the third Sounders FC player to get that recognition this season.
He scored in the first half to bring the Sounders back from a 2-1 deficit, then added two more in the waning moments after Seattle fell behind 4-2 in the second half, earning a valuable point away from home. Dempsey now has four goals and one assist in three MLS matches this season, putting him atop the league leaderboard, and was also named MLS Player of the Week.
He was joined on Team of the Week by goalkeeper Jeff Attinella (Real Salt Lake); defenders Andrew Farrell (New England Revolution), Bradley Orr (Toronto FC), Chris Schuler (Real Salt Lake) and Justin Morrow (Toronto FC); midfielders Michael Bradley (Toronto FC), Jose Mari (Colorado Rapids), Diego Chara (Portland Timbers) and Je-Vaughn Watson (FC Dallas); and forward Landon Donovan (LA Galaxy).
Sounders FC’s representatives on Team of the Week have been:
Week 1: DeAndre Yedlin.
Week 3: Djimi Traore.
Week 5: Clint Dempsey.
ON THIS DATE
On April 7, 2008, MLS Seattle became Sounders FC. Nearly 15,000 fans registered votes during a four-day election to name the MLS club that would play in Seattle. Nearly half of those submitted write-in votes with an overwhelming majority of those – over 80 percent – using something involving the Sounders. After the name was unveiled at the Space Needle, so was the club’s now emblematic Rave Green primary color and badge.
U-23S DIP INTO ACADEMY ALUMS
The Sounders FC U-23s kick off the 2014 season’s first training sessions soon and the PDL side has six former Sounders FC Academy players already slated to play this year.
Darwin Jones and Ryan Herman from the University of Washington and Chase Hanson from Seattle University were already set to return. On Friday, the club announced that Jordan Schweitzer of the University of Denver and UW players Ian Lange and Michael Gallagher would join them.
Under Head Coach Darren Sawatzky, who also serves as Director of Youth Development for Sounders FC, 15 players on the Sounders U-23s have gone on to play professionally in just two seasons.
