Cunningham's Milestone Night

It was a record setting night for FC Dallas striker Jeff Cunningham on Saturday. He scored four goals in a regular season match, also known as a beaver trick. That's only the tenth time in MLS history a player has achieved that feat. It's been three years since Brian Ching was the last to do it in the Houston Dynamo's first ever match. However, that's not what I meant by record setting. I'm sure most of you know that Clint Mathis holds the record for most goals in a single match with 5. When I say Cunningham broke a record, I'm referring to something else. Last night, Cunningham played in his 306th regular season match. As mentioned in the MLSnet match report linked above, he passed former Dallas star Jason Kreis on the all time list to move up to third. However, he also passed Kreis on another list: Cunningham now holds the league record for the most regular season games played without ever playing in an MLS Cup. It's good that he was able to mark the occasion with a stellar performance. Kreis was the "missing out" record holder from July 4, 2006 until August 1, 2009. The previous record holder before him was Mark Chung, who's now third. Here's the top 25 post-2008. Cunningham now joins the likes of fellow athletes Gary Anderson (NFL), Dale Ellis (NBA), Mike Gartner (NHL), and Rafael Palmeiro (MLB). All those players currently hold the distinction in their respective leagues.