Minnesota United coach Adrian Heath's message all week rang clear to his team that is undefeated in its past eight MLS and U.S. Open Cup games:

Don't let up.

United meets last-place Vancouver — a team it hasn't played since a 3-2 victory there in March's season opener — on Saturday after its first full week off since May.

Heath called his team's training on Thursday "terrible" and "really poor" and improved on Friday, but he reminded his players again on Friday how the sport can humble you.

"Everybody thinks it's easy now and we've cracked the code," Heath said. "It's not that easy. I've been doing this too long and know it can change as quickly again as it changed for us to get on this roll."

The last of those three previous league losses was a 1-0 defeat at Colorado on June 8. Since then, United has rolled, firmly positioning itself fourth in a Western Conference playoff race in which seven teams advance come October.

Heath said he has spoken to his team's leaders — presumably veterans Ozzie Alonso and Ike Opara, among them — about bringing the same stuff on Saturday. He has termed some of those qualities resilience, enthusiasm, desire, attitude.

"Without them, you don't win games of football," Heath said.

Vancouver, meanwhile, has lost its past five consecutive MLS games and tied three in a row before that. Its last victory was over Dallas on May 25.

"We don't need to dwell on our laurels," United goalkeeper Vito Mannone said. "We are right in the playoffs, but we've done nothing. I keep repeating to the boys, you can be as good as you want up to now, but you can ruin everything in a few games and yourselves out of the playoffs and not winning the Cup. It's easy as that."

Sizing up the situation

Site of the U.S. Women's national team's World Cup "Victory Tour" stop Sept. 3, Allianz Field is the only soccer-specific venue on the five-city tour that otherwise will be played in much larger American football stadiums, including the Rose Bowl and Philadelphia's Lincoln Financial Field.

U.S. Soccer Federation officials chose to include Minnesota and its new 19,400-seat stadium for a number of reasons. Among them: The women's national team hasn't played there since October 2016, its only visit since 2006. Fans' passion and the stadium's atmosphere impressed them when the U.S. men's national team headlined a sold-out Gold Cup doubleheader in June.