Sunday's game agains the Crew is absolutely massive, because the Red Bulls are horrendous on the road

The Red Bulls are in the playoffs. Hooray!

With two games to go, it might feel like the Red Bulls have a bit of breathing room and that not every game need to carry the must-win gravitas that some of the last few games seemed to have.

But they don't.

Here's why: While the Red Bulls are in the playoffs, if they're going to win the last remaining piece of hardware up for grabs -- the MLS Cup -- it'll help tremendously to play at home.

At the time of this writing, the Red Bulls are on a 10 game unbeaten streak at Red Bull Arena, going 8-0-2 in a timeframe that stretches back to late June. The road is a different story, where the Red Bulls have the worst goal differential out of all the playoff teams, at -12. The New England Revolution are the only team that even comes close, at -10. After that, the Vancouver Whitecaps, currently clinging to the West's fifth spot by a single point, are -6.

If the Red Bulls win this weekend against the Columbus Crew, they'll be on 50 points, which will clinch them home field advantage in the play-in game at the very least. If they were to win that, it's two-legged series until the MLS Cup Final (should they make it that far).

A win, too, keeps them in contention for the second or third spot. But, again, at the very least, a win keeps the Red Bulls from playing a winner-take-all one-off game for a spot in the conference semi-finals away from Red Bull Arena.