The Bennyfactor: Sporting Kansas City 3-1 Real Salt Lake

It was eerily similar to their quarterfinal match against the Houston Dynamo. The away side went up early, but then Sporting KC scored three unanswered goals to win 3-1 and advance to the next round of the US Open Cup.

And the next match is the US Open Cup final in Philadelphia.

Real Salt Lake took an early first half lead in the 24th minute off a poor defensive play by Kevin Ellis. Tony Beltran sent a ball up ahead of Olmes Garcia, who burned Kevin Ellis right at the edge of the box. It seemed Ellis gave up on the play after thinking Garcia was offside, and Garcia was alone on goal to make it 1-0 in favor of the away side.

Sporting KC started to gain the tempo back, however, and tied it back up in the 35th minute. Benny Feilhaber sent in a tantalizing cross on a set piece right in front of goal, where Soni Mustivar was there to head the ball home for his first goal with Sporting KC. Feilhaber's assist was his 18th in all competitions and the game was knotted up 1-1.

That scoreline would hold until halftime.

It took until the 81st minute for the deadlock to be broken, and the man who broke it was none other than Benny Feilhaber. Dom Dwyer worked two defenders to get a shot off in the middle of the box and it clanged off the post but it rebounded right to a charging Benny Feilhaber, who put it home in the open net for the score. This gave the home side an advantage with just more than ten minutes to play.

In continued similar fashion to the quarterfinal match against the Houston Dynamo, Sporting scored an insurance goal in the last five minutes. There was a miscue on the Real Salt Lake back line that resulted in a missed header, so Krisztian Nemeth worked around Rimando with the ball and calmly put it home for the third goal of the match. Feilhaber, of course, had the assist and this put the final nail in the coffin as Sporting KC clinched a berth in the US Open Cup finals.

The last action of the game would be Garcia being ejected for a malicious tackle on Feilhaber in stoppage time. Just a few seconds later and the final whistle was blown, making the Sporting KC berth in the USOC final official.

With Philadelphia's win over Chicago earlier in the night, Sporting KC will travel to Philadelphia to face the Union in the finals on Sept. 30. The Union hosted the final last year but fell to the Seattle Sounders. This is Sporting KC's first final since they won the tournament in 2012.