Congratulations are in order DC United, who are playoff-bound after their emphatic 4-1 win over the New York/New Jersey MetroStars. Now at 15-9-5, United sits in second place in the Eastern Conference, five points behind the conference leading New England Revolution with three games remaining in the regular season. DC are winners of four of their last five games, and Saturday’s four-goal output leave them tied with the Revolution as the MLS’ most prolific output – quite a turnaround from the beginning of the season, when they scored only twelve goals in their first eleven games.

And if you want to talk about turnaround, talk about the play of Jamil Walker. Months ago, the forward brought little more than blinding speed and hoped-for potential to the game. As he closes out the regular season, however, Walker’s IQ for the game seems to grow weekly. Capably flowing with the offense, Walker’s not only scoring more often, he’s making his teammates better by setting them up on plays like the gorgeous across-the-box assist that Ben Olsen forcefully headed into the net for the goal that would turn out to be the deciding goal.

United played well throughout the majority of the game, but a rough patch of play about twenty minutes into the game led to a MetroStars goal that sent the teams into the locker room with DC behind 1-0. New York midfielder Youri Djorkaeff boomed a centering blast into traffic in front of the goal, finding forward Mike Magee, who finessed the ball past Nick Rimando for the opening score. Minutes later, Rimando almost handed the MetroStars another opportunity after he became confused by the NFL field markings and handled the ball outside of his goal box.