Month: October 2018

Sporting KC travels to Vancouver Wednesday

Immersed in a battle for seeding in the Western Conference, playoff-bound Sporting Kansas City (15-8-8, 3rd place) ventures north of the border to face Vancouver Whitecaps FC (12-12-7, 8th place) on Wednesday night at BC Place.

The match will kick off at 9 p.m., with three hours of live coverage beginning at 8:30 p.m. on FOX Sports Kansas City, FOX Sports Midwest Plus and FOX Sports GO. Local radio broadcasts will air on ESPN 94.5 FM (English) and ESPN Deportes KC 1480 AM (Spanish), while the Sporting KC Uphoria app will provide in-game updates. Additionally, viewers outside of the FOX Sports Midwest footprint can stream the contest on ESPN+.

Manager Peter Vermes’ side has already punched its ticket to the Audi 2018 MLS Cup Playoffs, but the hunt for a top-two finish – and the Knockout Round bye that goes with it – has reached a fever pitch heading into the final fortnight of the regular season. Sporting KC enters the midweek clash in third place, four points back of leaders FC Dallas and three behind LAFC, with a game in hand on both clubs.

While Sporting KC is fighting for ideal playoff seeding, the Whitecaps are fighting for their postseason lives. Vancouver sits eighth in the West, three points behind Real Salt Lake for the sixth and final playoff spot. The Canadian side does have a game in hand on both RSL and seventh-place LA Galaxy, adding even more incentive for the hosts going into Wednesday.

A feisty 1-1 home draw with the Galaxy on Oct. 6 saw Sporting KC clinch a club-record eighth straight postseason berth. Zlatan Ibrahimovic fired the visitors ahead with a 25th-minute penalty kick, but Johnny Russell embarked on a dazzling solo run before notching a sublime 83rd-minute equalizer that ultimately won AT&T MLS Goal of the Week honors.

Russell, who leads the team in both goals (11) and assists (11) in all competitions, was one of three Sporting KC players selected for senior international duty during October’s FIFA window. The Scottish winger and Hungary forward Krisztian Nemeth have finished their national team commitments in Europe and traveled back across the Atlantic, while midfielder Felipe Gutierrez and Chile will meet Mexico tonight in Queretaro.

On the opposite sideline, Vancouver has up to six players who could feature tonight in international matches. That expansive list includes Canadian trio Alphonso Davies, Doneil Henry and Russell Teibert, Egypt midfielder Aly Ghazal, Costa Rica defender Kendall Waston and Peru forward Yordy Reina. These six players have combined for 129 appearances, 15 goals and 26 assists for the Whitecaps in 2018.

In particular, Davies leads MLS homegrown players with 17 combined goals (six) and assists (11) in league play, Waston is a reigning MLS Defender of the Year finalist, and Reyna owns a tie for the team lead with 11 assists.

Guided by interim head coach Craig Dalrymple, who took over for the released Carl Robinson on Sept. 25, Vancouver notched a crucial 2-1 road win over Toronto FC on Oct. 6 to preserve their playoff hopes.

Teibert gave the Whitecaps an early lead and Kei Kamara bagged a 78th-minute winner shortly after Jozy Altidore had equalized from the penalty spot. Kamara, who starred for Sporting KC from 2009-2013, leads the Caps with 14 league goals this season, eight more than any other teammate.

Sporting KC is in one of its best offensive seasons in club history, having scored 56 times through 31 games. That total is five shy of tying the 22-year-old team record. Vermes will hope his team can continue to cash in against a leaky Vancouver defense that has managed just two shutouts in 2018, the second-fewest in MLS.

The teams last met on April 20, when Russell ran riot en route to a hat-trick as Sporting KC prevailed 6-0 at Children’s Mercy Park. Jimmy Medranda, Cristian Lobato and Yohan Croizet also found the back of the net in a whitewash that equaled Sporting KC’s largest-ever margin of victory in a competitive match.

Kansas City owns a 7-3-3 regular season record against the Whitecaps, who had previously won four straight meetings in the series across all competitions before falling 6-0 this spring.

– Story from Sporting KC

Moran visits hospital to research federal issues

U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran, R- Kansas, toured the University of Kansas Health System in Kansas City, Kansas, on Monday and talked about the need for resources to combat drug abuse and the need for changes to encourage organ transplants.

The Senate has been discussing the opioid crisis and Sen. Moran said there was an increasing number of persons who are at the KU emergency department as a result of drug overdose, including drugs other than opioids.

The security of the ER is important because of the increasing number of patients with drug overdoses.

“I want to make sure that I know what I can do to combat drug abuse, provide the necessary resources for treatment and care, and also to make certain the opportunities are there for treatment in the community,” Sen. Moran said.

This was an opportunity to learn about what is occurring in the ER here in an urban area, and make certain they’re doing the things necessary to combat drug abuse and create an opportunity for greater mental health services in Greater Kansas City.

Significant challenges are faced with the lack of beds for treatment of mental health in Kansas, he added.

Chris Ruder, chief operating officer, said there is a challenge of having enough beds currently for mental health. By adding an additional campus in the fall of 2019 at the Strawberry Hill campus, there will be an additional 47 adult beds, he said. By adding another 32 beds to the Marillac facility, there will be a total of84 child and adolescent beds on that campus, he said.

“We believe that will continue to help bridge the gap, although there’s a lot of work needed, not just in our ED, but across the continuum of care for behavioral health,” Ruder said.

Sen. Moran also discussed the transplant program, particularly as it relates to liver transplants.

He said he wants to make sure that decisions made in Health and Human Services in Washington, D.C., are beneficial to this program.

“I want to make certain that every citizen of this region, Missouri and Kansas, have the opportunity when they need a transplant, to be able to obtain that transplant here at KU Health Systems,“ he said.

He said he wants to make sure in decisions made in Washington, D.C., that there is a reward for good behavior to increase the number of donors. He said the program here encourages organ donation and he wanted to make sure encouragement was rewarded.

“There is a movement afoot currently to take organs procured from this region, in Kansas City and Kansas in particular, and move them across the country,” Dr. Sean Kumer said. “That will decrease the transplants done here on our patients.”

That decreases access, he added, in communities like Kansas City. He said he is concerned with this movement going on, and the KU Health System wants to continue to procure organs and encourage those across the country to do the same.

Today is the last day to register to vote before the general election

Today is the last day to register to vote before the general election.

To see a story about voter registration, visit https://wyandotteonline.com/questions-and-answers-about-voter-registration-in-wyandotte-county/

or https://wyandotteonline.com/entertainer-from-kck-calls-attention-to-voter-registration-deadline-on-tuesday/