CARSON, Calif. – The party was raucous in the LA Galaxy's locker room Sunday afternoon after they claimed their third MLS Cup title in four years, but for A.J. DeLaGarza, the celebration was rather bittersweet.
The veteran defender capped his best season as a pro with a superb performance in LA's 2-1 overtime victory against the visiting New England Revolution, but his tears of joy mingled with tears of pain as he reflected on the most difficult of his 27 years.
He was delighted with the outcome, of course, one that relied heavily on his mammoth stop against Charlie Davies midway through the first half, but something big was missing.
“I've said it before, this is my best year on the field and my worst year off the field personally,” DeLaGarza told a media scrum in the StubHub Center locker room following the title game. “At the end of the game, you guys saw I just kind of laid there and sobbed a little bit.
“Obviously, I wish my son was here, so that was all I thought about.”
DeLaGarza and his wife, Megan, lost their first child to a congenital heart defect just a week after he was born last summer. It prompted an outpouring of support from throughout the Galaxy organization, the league and among fans of all MLS clubs, which touched the DeLaGarzas deeply.
It was a tragedy that brought a tight-knit team closer together, but Luca DeLaGarza's death was amplified, to some extent, by a baby boom among his teammates. Another nine Galaxy players have had children in the past year, and Marcelo Sarvas' wife is expecting.
DeLaGarza, who wore one of the “Luca Knows Heart” T-shirts created to support Children's Hospital Los Angeles and commemorate his son, always has Luca on his mind. He was asked how this year's championship compares with those LA won in 2011 and 2012.
“This one is a little different, for obvious reasons,” he replied. “A lot of guys got to have their kids out there, and that was hard. But move on.”
One never gets over the death of their child, and DeLaGarza used the soccer field this year as a safe haven, a place he could escape the fear in the months before Luca's birth and the pain that followed his passing.
He responded with an extraordinary campaign, starring at all four positions along the Galaxy's often injury-riddled backline, and he was outstanding at both right back and, for the overtime period, left back against New England.
He made several important defensive plays, none bigger than sprinting alongside Davies step-for-step before sliding to block his shot in the 23rd minute to keep the game scoreless.
“We didn't know if he was going to play [after he missed the second leg of the Western Conference final against Seattle with a hamstring injury], and it really was a mark of his year, the way he stepped up,” said Galaxy president Chris Klein, a former teammate of DeLaGarza's. “The play he made in the first half was really, really incredible.
“They put that one in, who knows? The game changes. [New England is] a young team, so maybe they get some momentum. ... A.J. doesn't amaze me anymore, with what he's done and the resilience that he's shown.”
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It was a critical play for DeLaGarza. Prior to that, he wasn't sure how well his hamstring was going to hold up.
“That was the first real test for my hamstring. I didn't feel it, and I was comfortable with whatever else after that,” he said. “It was important to keep them off the board ... a good play I had to make to help the team.”
It might have been the play of the game, at least until Robbie Keane tucked away a splendid long-distance feed from Sarvas to deliver the victory.
“Just a lot of emotions right now,” DeLaGarza said in the aftermath. “The year we've all been through, it's been crazy, but there is no better way to go out than winning a championship at home in front of your fans.”
