Tai Baribo's first career hat trick earned the Philadelphia Union striker MLS Player of the Matchday presented by Michelob Ultra honors for Matchday 27.
The Israeli international struck three times in Wednesday night's 5-1 rout of the New England Revolution. The victory snapped Philadelphia's 10-game winless run and featured the record-breaking debut of 14-year-old Union phenom Cavan Sullivan.
With his hat trick, Baribo now has four goals in his last two games for a total of six this season in just 549 minutes of action. Among all MLS players with at least 500 minutes played, Baribo’s 0.98 goals per 90 minutes average ranks third behind only Inter Miami CF’s Lionel Messi (1.04) and Minnesota United FC’s Tani Oluwaseyi (1.01).
The Union are the league's only team with four different players to score a hat trick – Baribo, Dániel Gazdag (two), Julián Carranza (two) and Mikael Uhre – since the start of 2022. Baribo is the first Israeli Player of the Matchday and Philadelphia's first honoree since Gazdag took the prize in Matchday 25 of last season.
Philadelphia will look to make it two wins in a row before the Leagues Cup break when hosting Nashville SC on Saturday night at Subaru Park (7:30 pm ET | MLS Season Pass).
The MLS Player of the Matchday is selected each matchday of the regular season through both media and fan voting in a process conducted by MLS Communications. A panel of journalists from the North American Soccer Reporters (NASR) comprises 75 percent of the vote, while an X (formerly known as Twitter) fan vote represents the remaining 25 percent of voting. NASR consists of members of print, television, radio, and online media.
