By Ben Leonard
Follow @ben___leonard

photo credit: San Jose Mercury News–San Jose Earthquakes David Bingham (1) makes a save against the Colorado Rapids Sunday

SAN JOSE, Calif. —On a blustery, cold day at Avaya Stadium, the ominous grey chill seemed to freeze up the Earthquakes offense. Near misses and wasted possessions plagued San Jose in its opener, with a new-look offense in need of some tuneups.

In the face of these miscues, one man stood tall: keeper David Bingham. The Colorado Rapids pounded Bingham with shot after shot, but he fought through opener jitters to keep the Rapids off the board in a 1-0 Earthquakes victory. Bingham made leading save after leaping save, majestically leaping like a gazelle to break the Rapids’ hearts over and over again.

The Rapids got off a whopping 18 shots, including 10 inside the box, but the sure-handed Bingham didn’t give in — it’s not in his DNA. Bingham fought his way through four years in the lower level North American soccer league with the San Antonio Scorpions, even playing for Norway’s Strømmen IF, working his way up to San Jose last season to find his way into the starting lineup. As an MLS journeyman, he has become accustomed to dealing with adversity.

In last year’s season opener, his debut as a starter, Bigham found himself on the other side of things against Dallas, losing 1-0. Not one for drama, Bingham dismissed notions that his experience helped flip the script: “It’s the opening game of the season, so you’re excited for it, just like last season. This year obviously I have a year and 34 games under me, so that was nice, but at the end of the day, you have to be prepared for each game and I felt like we were today.”

Bingham was quick to credit his teammates’ stingy defense, especially from the dynamic duo of Victor Bernárdez and Clarence Goodson, who both came up with huge tackles to save goals, for his success today. “It’s huge. I think without either one of their tackles, I think they finish those chances. It’s great plays on their half, and you have two guys who have played for their national teams for years and years, so it’s great to have them healthy. When we’re healthy, we have one of the best back fours in the league.”

Bingham also did well in order to fight subpar conditions on the field. Heavy rain in previous days had softened the turf significantly, and there were lots of confetti and streamers littering the goalie’s box for the opening festivities. Several players lost their footing on the wet sod, killing several key chances. Bingham, however, thought it was just “part of the game” that it was a little sloppy in some places, something he just “had to deal with and move on from.”

Overall, Bingham was satisfied with the team’s performance: “I thought it was a good game defensively, [even though] we had some moments where we obviously weren’t up to par. But I think it’s most important to get the win, and we got the shutout today, which is nice. we know what we need to work on going forward, and we’ll work on it this week to take a step forward for next weekend.