Well, it can’t be any worse than last time, right?

That question must have been on at least a few anxious Austin FC supporters’ minds as they walked into Q2 Stadium Saturday night for the Verde and Black’s match against the indefatigable Vancouver Whitecaps.

Verde’s April trip to the Great White North resulted in a 5-1 beatdown from the Whitecaps. Did Brian White score 50 goals in that match? No, only four, but it sure felt like 50. And since Verde’s unfortunate trek north of the border, the team has provided little evidence that it has learned any lessons.

Austin FC entered Saturday night with only one win in the five MLS contests since its Vancouver vaporizing. All the Whitecaps have done in that time is go unbeaten in league play while advancing to the Concacaf Champions Cup final at the expense of Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami.

Which makes the 0-0 draw that Austin FC ultimately earned equally improbable and impressive. Just for a team to walk away from an encounter with the Jesper Sorensen Whitecaps with its dignity intact is a noteworthy achievement. Austin FC did better than that. Nico Estevez’s side outshot its more celebrated visitors 15 to five and comfortably got the better of the Whitecaps on expected goals (xG). The Verde and Black recorded 1.39 xG to Vancouver’s .26 (all stats per FotMob.com or FBRef.com unless otherwise noted). The Whitecaps' Saturday xG total is genuinely eyebrow-raising: Vancouver entered the match averaging 1.85 xG per 90 minutes - the second-highest figure in MLS.

While the Whitecaps had marginally more possession on the night - Vancouver had 56% of the ball to Austin’s 44% - Verde had more of the ball where it counts: in the opposition penalty area. Austin FC had 34 touches in Vancouver’s penalty area, with the Whitecaps only managing 14 in Verde’s. Vancouver came into the contest averaging 29.6 opposition penalty box touches per 90, the most in the league and over three more than the team with the second-most, the Seattle Sounders.

Estevez’s team accomplished this territorial dominance with a more intense press that it typically deploys, successfully disrupting Vancouver’s rhythm while building up. Per the excellent work of MLS Analytics on Bluesky (@mlsstat.bsky.social), the average height of Austin FC’s defensive actions on Saturday was 43.17 meters, roughly four meters higher than the team’s season average.

“It was two plans,” Estevez said in his post-match press conference. “It was moments that we chose on goal kicks to high press them, be very, very aggressive…then we could win the ball and get good opportunities in transition. And it was more like a mid-block…to high press. Force them to play backwards and then, from there, build pressure. And I think the team did a pretty good job of that,” he continued.

Estevez electing to go toe-to-toe and engage a dangerous, possession-heavy team high up the field feels significant. Consider the March visit of San Diego FC to Q2 Stadium. Austin FC rope-a-doped its way to a defend-and-counter 2-1 win while having only 24% of the ball. The average height of Verde’s defensive actions in that match was just 26.92 meters. Estevez might now be more confident in his team’s ability to enact a more aggressive strategy against tough opposition. A challenge all season, the balance between attack and defense was good on Saturday. That Austin FC came out of its shell defensively without getting ripped apart by a slick passing team is encouraging.

Also encouraging was Osman Bukari's performance. Look, the similarities with a former Austin FC Designated Player (DP) who shall remain nameless (a hint in honor of the NHL playoffs: his name rhymes with Zamboni) are getting more difficult to ignore with each passing goalless match. Two goals and three assists across 23 appearances isn’t good enough for a regular starting forward, let alone a DP forward. But Bukari was Austin FC’s most consistent attacking threat against Vancouver.

“It was a game plan to find him (Bukari) more straightforward, more with diagonal balls early in the game in order to put pressure on them (Vancouver),” Estevez said of Bukari’s performance post-match.

Verde’s game plan helped produce one of Bukari’s liveliest displays in some time. The Ghanaian’s 34 touches were more than he’s had in a match since March 8th against the Colorado Rapids. And crucially, seven of Bukari's touches came inside Vancouver’s penalty area (Bukari’s season average for touches in the penalty area before Saturday was 4.89 per 90).

Bukari is a shifty presence in possession. Getting him on the ball in and around the opposition penalty area, where he can slide by defenders with a clever drop of the shoulder and a deft dribble, will get the best out of him. Too often this season, Bukari has stayed out wide instead of fluttering around in danger areas closer to the opponent’s goal.

Here is Bukari’s touch map from Austin FC’s 3-0 loss to Minnesota United (this was the last time Bukari started a match down his preferred right flank as he and Myrto Uzuni swapped sides for Wednesday’s game against Atlanta United).

And here is Bukari’s touch map against Vancouver.

The closer Austin FC can get Bukari on the ball near the opposition penalty area, the more effective he will be. Still, despite the positives, the match was yet another occasion where Bukari and his fellow forwards fluffed their lines in front of goal. Like the Atlanta match, Austin FC failed to turn strong stretches of good possession play into goals, and just two points from two consecutive home matches isn’t ideal.

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“We’ve dropped some results here at home we didn’t want to drop,” Austin FC goalkeeper Brad Stuver said after the match. “If we take this game (the Vancouver game)…it’s a really good performance. There are a lot of good things both offensively and defensively. Now its just about being a little bit more ruthless on the attack. Just punishing the opponent and making sure we put those chances away,” he added.