Coronel, Carlos Coronel, New York Red Bulls, goaltender, goalie, soccer, MLS
Carlos Coronel (Photo by Kaitlin Marold - JSN)

Coronel gets redemption, while Tolkin's play is assention

For the first time in a very long time, the New York Red Bulls played a complete game. From the start of the match, all the way to the end, the Red Bulls, played a complete 90 minutes against the defending MLS Cup Champions in the Columbus Crew.

But while it's a big victory to end a seven-match winless streak, there were two distinctive players who made their stock rise, and it was for the right reasons. We begin the story with the man in goal in Carlos Coronel who earned his sixth clean sheet of the season.

Since the beginning of the season, I have been very hard on Coronel due to the fact his positioning has been flawed and terrible on his goalline. He has made head-scratching decisions in the net, either peeling off his post too early or putting himself into no man's land and the opposition has found ways to beat him easily.

Well for the last month and more his positioning has gotten better, and it showed on Wednesday night when he made four spectacular saves to earn the victory. All four saves were from point-blank range as Coronel's reflexes did all the talking. He has looked better, and now he can go and dominate the league.

NJ Native, John Tolkin Joined Coronel in Leading RBNY

For Academy product John Tolkin, he has come out of nowhere and is a pleasant surprise for a club that many thought wasn't going to have a clear plan or a proper direction to this season. So far Tolkin has shined brightly since the injury to Andrew Gutman happened on the road at the Los Angeles Galaxy back on April 25.

His defending has been strong while patrolling the left side as a fullback, making solid stops and clean tackles along the way. But when Gutman made his return to the lineup, Head Coach Gerhart Struber knew he couldn't allow Tolkin to take a seat on the substitutes bench. He had to continue to use him in some capacity.

So he made Tolkin into a defender, which means he would ow patrol the midfield on the left wing while going forward a little bit more and so far it's been a solid success. The reward for Tolkin finally came in the 33rd minute of the match when he made a strong tackle in his own end to start the attacking run.

With a little help from his friends, Tolkin got a nice pass to attack the net, made a cut to his left, and slotted it home past Crew goalkeeper Elroy Room to score his first MLS goal. What an amazing moment for a young kid from Chatham Borough, New Jersey as the Red Bulls Academy keeps on churning strong players, while reports continue on to say their pipeline is dry.

Maybe some of the talent is not ready to make the jump to the first time, but there is no way that pipeline in the New York Red Bulls academy has dried up completely. First Tyler Adams, then Caden Clark, now John Tolkin, and who knows who will be next to make the move to the first team bench down the road.

But right now these two players have been fun to watch, and let's hope they continue to have strong seasons to dig out of this hole as the Hudson River Derby is next up over this weekend.