Joseph Paintsil, Dejan Joveljic and Maruicio Cuevas scored goals and the visiting Los Angeles Galaxy stretched their winning streak to four matches with a 3-0 victory over the San Jose Earthquakes on Saturday night at Stanford, Calif.
Gabriel Pec set up the first goal with an assist and John McCarthy recorded his fifth shutout of the season as the Galaxy dominated the latest edition of the California Clasico. Los Angeles has won all three meetings this season.
The Galaxy (11-3-7, 40 points) have won six of their past seven matches and are tied with Los Angeles FC for first place in the Western Conference.
San Jose played its first match under interim coach Ian Russell after the firing of Luchi Gonzalez but its woes continued.
The Earthquakes (3-15-2, MLS-low 11 points) dropped their fifth straight game and are 0-7-1 over their last eight matches.
San Jose has been outscored 20-6 during the five-game slide.
McCarthy made six saves while posting his third straight shutout.
William Yarbrough made four saves for San Jose.
Galaxy standout Riqui Puig entered the game in the 55th minute in his return from a three-game absence due to a groin injury.
The first Los Angeles goal, in the 37th minute, came on the counterattack.
The Earthquakes put pressure on the Galaxy and Jeremy Ebobisse had his header stopped by McCarthy.
Los Angeles then took off in the other direction. Pec was on the right side and sent a pass over to the left to Paintsil. Yarbrough tried to cut down the angle but Paintsil sent a left-footed shot into the net for his sixth goal of the season.
The Earthquakes had a major chance in the 61st minute as Benjamin Kikanovic threaded a pass to uncovered Preston Judd. Though he was stationed just to the right of the net, Judd badly missed the shot with the ball going further to the right.
Four minutes later, Puig took a hard straightaway right-footed shot and Yarbrough made a solid save with his right hand to keep the Quakes down one.
When Puig got another chance, he drilled a right-footed shot that caromed high off the right goalpost in the 72nd minute. Yarbrough was out of position for the rebound as Joveljic headed it in for his 12th goal of the season.
Cuevas scored his first MLS goal with a close-range right-footed shot in the first minute of second-half stoppage time.
San Jose had an 18-14 edge in shots but Los Angeles put more on target (7 to 6).
–Field Level Media
