Midfielder Danny O'Rourke stretched, showered, then prepared for an interview at the team's Obetz training center, but his mind was still on what had transpired about 30 minutes earlier.
"Everybody wanted to win out there. Practice is over, our team ended up losing and I'm still (ticked) off about it," he said. "If we can breed that practice every day, that competitiveness will translate into games and hopefully make us a successful team."
By any measure, the Crew are having a renaissance year as they sit near the top of the Eastern Conference and the overall MLS table. A win Saturday at home against Real Salt Lake would enable the Crew to equal its point total (37) in 30 games last season.
They have already surpassed the 33 points Sigi Schmid had in 2006 in his first season as coach. The 38 points the Crew had the previous year when they started a string of three consecutive non-playoff seasons should be a distant memory soon, too.
Yes, the times are changing - for the better.
"This year has been awesome, obviously, because we've been winning. Our chemistry has always been great in the locker room. We have great guys and everybody gets along. There's no hot heads or egos," said defender Jed Zayner, who was a rookie in 2006. "It took a couple of years to build that. We've put the people in the right position and now we fight for each other and fight to win."
The key, said midfielder Pat Noonan, is to make sure that fighting spirit is a positive trait and not one that will divide the locker room because players have their own agendas. In five seasons with New England he saw the Revolution make the MLS Cup a fall rite of passage.
"It's about having the coach that can get the right players and being in the right atmosphere. It's not easy to do at the professional level and (New England coach) Steve Nicol did a great job getting guys that enjoyed playing together and worked hard," he said.
Although Noonan has been with the team less than two weeks he witnessed another in a string of comebacks this season for the Crew in his first outing, a 2-1 against FC Dallas last Saturday.
"We came back last week against Dallas and got a good victory. These guys look like they work hard on and off the field," he said. "Sigi's got a good group of young guys that work hard and get along on and off the field. It goes a long way because when you got guys that want to play for each other and win for each other it makes things a lot easier."
Schmid has added players with international success such as forward Guillermo Barros Schelotto and MLS Cup winners in forward Alejandro Moreno, defender Ezra Hendrickson and midfielder Brian Carroll.
"There's a good group of guys here who have been involved in some successful teams and when you have that experience mixed in with some good results you build a little bit of confidence and maybe that has helped us play a little better each game," said Carroll, a member of D.C. United's 2004 championship team. "It feels like a good team. We need to continue to improve and work for each other and let the results take care of themselves and not worry about the past."
Schmid said a culture of winning has finally been discovered by Columbus.
"The mentality is much better. You always want to create competitive training sessions. That's the most important thing to create as you try to improve the team," he said. "Very few teams in this league have won 50 percent of their games. I think it's us and New England. From that standpoint I'm very proud of what we've done. As you go through the experience of winning, as you go through the experience of being behind and winning the game, that's something you can do to help your confidence."
Yet, he knows better than anyone that now is not the time to be satisfied. As well as the Crew have played through two-thirds of the season, they have clinched nothing.
"What this team needs to do is win games that are big games or there's something on the line whether that's an Open Cup game or, 'Today's game puts us in first place.' That's the next thing we need to get confidence in but we've made huge strides," he said.
With winning comes more pressure from the fans and within the team to make this a special season for a club that has never played for the MLS Cup.
"Expectations have to be based in reality and we have the reality now that our expectations are reasonable and are expectations are to win every time we step on the field," Schmid said. "Our expectations are to make it to the playoffs and our expectations are to compete for other postseason awards and the MLS title."
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