It took penalties but Real Salt Lake prevailed over the LA Galaxy Sunday night at Qwest Field in Seattle, winning their first MLS Cup title in their first appearance in the title match. RSL goalkeeper Nick Rimando was the hero once more, saving two penalties and deservedly winning the 2009 MLS Cup MVP.

Kali Korbis has the happy recap from Utah.

View the photo gallery here.

Join ASN’s editors and a cast of prominent soccer bloggers to follow MLS Cup 2009 live and see who will be crowned MLS champs!

Nick Rimando saved three Chicago Fire penalty kicks to help Real Salt Lake win the Eastern Conference on a shootout after 120 minutes of soccer yielded no goals for either team. The victory puts RSL in its first-ever MLS Cup game where they will face the LA Galaxy, victors of a dramatic conference final of their own Friday, and completes a stunning late-season turnaround for the Salt Lake City side.

Jason Kreis’ squad needed the final regular season matchday to sneak into the postseason, then upset the defending champion Columbus Crew in the Eastern Conference semifinal.

The loss is a bitter pill to swallow for Chicago, which has now lost three consecutive Eastern Conference finals. Reporting from Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Ill., ASN’s Jeff Tobin has more on the disappointing end to the Fire season, including player ratings.

Check out the RSL Conference champions photo montage courtesy of ASN’s Julie Harper.

Perhaps it was only fitting that on Friday the 13th, there would be not one, but two power outages at the Home Depot Center.

Eighteen minutes into the Western Conference Final match between the Los Angeles Galaxy and Houston Dynamo, the lights on the upper deck at the Home Depot Center went out, causing a stoppage in play that would last about 18 minutes. Galaxy officials traced the power failure to “Significant power dips in Southern California Edison Industrial grid in which the facility sits,” The same thing occurred again five minutes into the second half and lasted about 15 minutes.

Despite the interruptions, play was very competitive and the match very closely fought. “It was a game that could’ve gone either way,” Galaxy head coach Bruce Arena admitted afterwards. “They had their chances and we had ours.”

Just as it had in the semifinal return leg against Chivas, the winning goal of the Western Conference finals originated with David Beckham. This time, the play occurred in extra time after English midfielder lofted a freekick into the Houston Dynamo penalty box.

ASN's Ivan Yeo reports from Carson, Calif.

While newly-minted MLS coach of the year Bruce Arena has assembled an LA Galaxy team largely from scratch (outside of its two superstars of course) the squad they host in the Western Conference final tomorrow night counts on a core of players that has played together for years. “You kind of know when you need to step it up and raise your game,” said Brian Ching. “That’s one of the benefits of having a team with so much experience on it,”

ASN's Donald Buckholt reports from Houston.

ASN's Craig Bennett was at Home Depot Center Sunday evening gathering photographic evidence from the return leg of the LA Galaxy v Chivas USA playoff matchup. (Read the match report).

Proceed to the photo gallery.

All photos ©ASN/Craig Bennett, 112575 Media Inc. To see more of Craig's work check out his Web site.

“The Galaxy made one play.”–The extent of Chivas USA head coach Preki‘s reaction to his team’s 1-0 loss to crosstown rivals LA Galaxy Sunday night. With the loss, Chivas made its fourth straight first round playoff exit. After the final whistle a visibly irate Preki appeared to have words with Galaxy midfielder Demo Kovalenko, though the two were quickly separated.

After Real Salt Lake’s stunning upset of Supporters’ Shield winner and defending MLS Cup champions Columbus Crew Thursday, the favorites prevailed in all other playoff matchups over the weekend. It took overtime before Brian Ching’s inspired effort broke a scoreless deadlock and put the Houston Dynamo past the pesky Seattle Sounders in Sunday’s first game. In Los Angeles, David Beckham and Landon Donovan worked their magic to establish a play that would lead to a 73rd minute penalty kick, which the Galaxy captain coolly converted. Sunday’s results set up a showdown between the Galaxy and Houston, old acquaintances from when the Dynamo were the San Jose Earthquakes. The meeting will take place Friday at the Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif.

The Chicago Fire will host the Eastern Conference final against Real Salt Lake after the Fire prevailed against New England on Saturday night.

Donald Buckholt attended the Houston-Seattle match at Robertson stadium and filed the following report. He also supplied player ratings for the victorious Dynamo.

Ivan Yeo was on hand at the Home Depot Center to witness the Galaxy’s victory. Here is his report.

A nifty second half goal by Cuauhtemoc Blanco gave the Chicago Fire the goal it needed to advance past the New England Revolution in a hard fought Eastern Conference semifinal at Toyota Park Saturday. With the victory Chicago advances to the Eastern Conference final for the second straight year where they will host Real Salt Lake next week.

Jeff Tobin reports from Bridgeview, Ill.

Or skip right to the Fire player ratings.