Toronto FC vs. Montreal Impact encapsulates the best of Rivalry Week

MONTREAL -- Toronto FC is the best team in MLS right now, and really, it isn't even close. The Reds pulled into first place in the Eastern Conference on Wednesday, following their 2-1 win in Orlando, and while two Western clubs -- FC Dallas and the Colorado Rapids -- boast higher points-per-game averages than TFC's, Greg Vanney's side gets the nod based on its scary-good current form: a seven-match unbeaten run in which they've gone 6-0-1 and outscored opponents 18-5.
Why would members of the sputtering Montreal Impact be looking forward to Saturday's game in Toronto against their rampaging archenemy?
Easy. It's a rivalry.
"They're in first place, and for us, it's a big challenge," Impact coach Mauro Biello said after his team tied D.C. United 1-1 in its own midweek tilt. "But there's no better game to ask for to spring us in the right direction than having a good performance against Toronto, that's for sure."
The history between the clubs dates only to 2007, when Toronto became the league's first Canadian franchise. It grew after the Impact, then in the second tier, beat the Reds in Toronto to qualify for the 2008-09 CONCACAF Champions League. It rose to another level still when Montreal joined the top flight four years ago and immediately produced better results than TFC, which failed to reach the playoffs in each of its first eight seasons -- an MLS record for futility.
But the rivalry has really popped off the past two years. Both clubs signed big-money designated players -- the Impact Didier Drogba, TFC Jozy Altidore and Sebastian Giovinco -- in 2015 and began ascending the established order in the East. As fate would have it, they met in the knockout round of the playoffs last fall, with Montreal routing TFC 3-0 in the first and only postseason match Toronto has ever played.
"Since last season, especially probably the last game we played them in the playoffs, things have escalated," Impact captain Patrice Bernier told ESPN FC.

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As with all good rivalries, the roots go well beyond sport. Canada's two largest cities are separated by just 300 miles of highway, but they're worlds apart in most other ways. The animosity between the two goes back to bloody battles between English and French armies in the mid-1700s. Even now, they literally don't speak the same language, with French the mother tongue of the majority of Montreal's 3.5 million inhabitants.
Toronto replaced Montreal as Canada's economic engine in the last quarter of the 20th century, but the latter's sports teams -- especially in hockey, the country's most popular sport -- have been more successful and a point of pride.
As an American, Impact keeper Evan Bush didn't know much about the history between the cities when he arrived in Montreal in 2011, when the club was still in the second tier. These days, he thinks the cultural underpinnings make it the league's most authentic.
"If you look at rivalries around the league, a lot of them are manufactured. Even Seattle-Portland, there's a lot of history there, but it's a little manufactured," Bush told ESPN FC. "If you're not from here, you might think Toronto-Montreal is the same thing. It's not. It goes much deeper than soccer."
"The Toronto-Montreal rivalry is one of the best in all of sports," TFC midfielder and Toronto native Jonathan Osorio said in a phone interview. "I've been to Canadiens-[Maple] Leafs games. It's always a hostile atmosphere. It's the same in MLS. Even when Montreal was in the NASL, it was still a big game for the supporters of both clubs. Now it's a fixture that everybody looks forward to around the league, I think."

Montreal Impact's Laurent Ciman, left, talks it out with Toronto FC's Sebastian Giovinco.

TFC won the only previous meeting in league play this season. That 2-0 victory at Stade Saputo in April was a measure of revenge for last year's humiliating elimination there, and TFC also beat the Impact 4-2 over two games in June in the Canadian Championship.
Still, Quebec-born Bernier can't wait for Saturday's match, however well the hosts are playing.
"It doesn't mean anything," Bernier said of Toronto's recent run. "There's still a lot of games left. They can peak now and lose every game for the rest of the season.
"We're never scared of that team," he continued. "They're good. They're better than before. But it's Toronto. We'll step up to the plate."
They'll have to. After losing just once in 10 games, Montreal has just one win in its past five. Meanwhile, Toronto is showing no signs of slowing down. The ret-hot Altidore will be fresh too, having played just the final 32 minutes against Orlando City (enough to score TFC's late winner, his fifth goal in six matches). Osorio even thinks his team has room to improve.
"We knew from the beginning of the season that if we got things clicking with everyone, the chemistry, we would be a contender," he said. "But we haven't hit our best stride yet. When we do, we know what we're capable of. But right now it's about the present and getting a win for our fans. It's always an important match against Montreal."
Doug McIntyre is a staff writer for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN FC. Follow him on Twitter @DougMacESPN.