Preview: First-place Sporting KC treks north of the border to face Vancouver Whitecaps FC

First-place Sporting Kansas City (6-2-4, 22 points) will play its third match in eight days when the club ventures north of the border to face Vancouver Whitecaps FC (4-5-1, 13 points) at 6 p.m. CT Saturday.

FOX Sports Kansas City and FOX Sports Midwest will air three hours of live coverage beginning at 5:30 p.m. CT, while local radio broadcasts will be available on ESPN 99.3 FM (English) and La Grande 1340 AM (Spanish). The match will also stream live on FOX Sports GO with additional live updates via the Sporting KC Uphoria app.

All supporters are welcome to attend the official watch party for Saturday’s match at No Other Pub in the Kansas City Power & Light District (1370 Grand Blvd.). Beginning at 5:30 p.m. CT, No Other Pub will offer 16-oz. Corona cans for $5 and an all-you-can-eat buffet including hot dogs, hamburgers, wings, cheese curds and bottomless domestic draft beer and soda.

Gerso fired Sporting Kansas City to the summit of the Western Conference standings with a superb second-half hat-trick in Wednesday’s 3-0 home win over defending MLS Cup champion Seattle Sounders FC. The 26-year-old Designated Player bagged all three goals during a scintillating 13-minute spell after halftime, becoming the sixth player in club history to score an MLS hat-trick and the first to do so at Children’s Mercy Park. The result extended Sporting Kansas City’s club-record home unbeaten run to 15 regular season matches dating back to last June.

Manager Peter Vermes has found a potent scoring punch from multiple players over the last fortnight. Gerso, Dom Dwyer and Latif Blessing have each recorded a multi-goal game since the start of May, allowing Sporting Kansas City to couple its stingy defense with a multidimensional attack. Anchored by center backs Matt Besler and Ike Opara and shielded by in-form goalkeeper Tim Melia, Sporting KC boasts seven shutouts and a 0.58 goals against average — both of which rank first in MLS.

Vancouver finally returns to BC Place on Saturday after a four-game road swing that spanned an entire month. The Whitecaps most recently fell to the Houston Dynamo by a 2-1 scoreline last Friday, conceding twice before substitute Brek Shea halved the deficit with five minutes remaining. The defeat snapped a two-game winning streak that saw Vancouver claim narrow victories at the Montreal Impact and Colorado Rapids on April 29 and May 5, respectively.

Led by fourth-year head coach Carl Robinson, Vancouver is looking to return to the MLS Cup Playoffs after missing out in 2016 with an eighth-place finish. The Whitecaps currently sit sixth in the Western Conference standings ahead of a four-game MLS homestand that will include visits from Sporting KC, D.C. United, Atlanta United FC and FC Dallas.

Fredy Montero, a high-profile Designated Player acquisition who joined Vancouver in February, tops Vancouver’s scoring chart with four league goals. Shea, Cristian Techera and Matias Laba have added two each in MLS for a Whitecaps outfit that made a spirited run to the 2016-17 CONCACAF Champions League semifinals before bowing out to Tigres UANL in early April.

Vermes’ men have held a decisive upper hand in the head-to-head series, going 6-1-3 against Vancouver in the regular season since 2011. The Whitecaps’ lone win came on Aug. 10, 2014, a 2-0 result at BC Place. Sporting Kansas City also owns an excellent record against Canadian clubs, going a combined 26-8-11 versus Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto FC — including a 10-5-8 mark on Canadian soil.

In addition to missing striker Diego Rubio (ACL), Sporting Kansas City faces the prospect of losing Dwyer for Saturday’s contest. The forward is listed as questionable heading into the weekend with a knee injury.

Saturday’s hosts, meanwhile, will be without six first-team players. Long-term absentees David Edgar (knee), Brett Levis (knee) and Yordy Reyna (foot) are joined by Christian Dean (foot), Erik Hurtado (foot) and Bernie Ibini (hamstring) on a lengthy injury list.