There's no question that Sporting KC's backs are to the wall: not only to do they have to beat the Houston Dynamo, something they haven't done in four meetings this season, but they also have to win by at least two goals.

One person who is embracing the challenge is fiery KC goalkeeper Jimmy Nielsen, who reportedly left a profanity-laced message spurring on the his teammates on their locker room bulletin board and told reporters on Tuesday that he is confident in Sporting's chances (courtesy of SportingKC.com):

"I have a very good feeling about tomorrow. Why do I have that feeling? We've played Houston a number of times with no success," he said. "But we've been talking about it Monday. We talked a little bit about it Tuesday. When we're together as a group, we very often have a feeling. You don't know anything about the results, of course. You have to get out there and play. But the atmosphere and the way we've been looking at each other give me big confidence for tomorrow."

Even with the loss, KC's season hasn't been a total failure, as they already qualified for 2013-2014 CONCACAF Champions League earlier in the season.

Nevertheless, despite the long odds against them, Nielsen, the team's captain, doesn't appear ready to go down without a fight.