Missing both a permanent head coach and their best player, Minnesota United opened their eighth MLS season with a rousing 2-1 victory Saturday night over Austin FC at Q2 Stadium.

Veteran attacker Robin Lod scored the game's first goal in his first game back since season-ending knee surgery last May. It came in the 34th minute and stood alone until Loons newcomer Alejandro Bran and Austin's Guilherme Biro exchanged goals in the 91st and 95th minutes.

The Loons won their season opener on the road for the second time in as many years, this time without injured star Emanuel Reynoso and with interim Cameron Knowles coaching for a team still waiting for its next coach, Manchester United assistant Eric Ramsay, who signed a contract last week, to arrive on the job.

"It was fantastic," Knowles said. "Right from the start, the guys showed trust in each other and a lot of belief. They were able to put Austin under a lot of pressure and created some good chances and they just kept building on it."

The Loons dominated the first half with pressing defense and the energy it created, then held on fiercely at the end in Knowles's MLS head coaching debut. Knowles has coached 12 seasons as a MLS assistant and second-team head coach, but Saturday was his first game as a head coach while the club awaits Ramsay's arrival.

The victory also came without starters Bongokuhle Hlongwane and Kervin Arriaga.

Lod played just 10 games in 2023. He hadn't scored since May 2022, but on Saturday he scored the only goal in a first half when the Loons could have — and probably should have — scored two or three more.

Finnish national teammate Teemu Pukki played the ball ahead to Sang Bin Jeong on the right side. Austin goalkeeper Brad Stuver, who kept his team in the game nearly single-handedly during the first half, deflected the Sang Bin's cross near the goal line, but Lod was on the far side with an off-balance, left-footed volley that gave Stuver no chance.

"I thought he was outstanding," Knowles said of Lod. "You see the relationship of him and Pukki, defending, putting pressure on. He was very, very good on both sides of the ball."

BOXSCORE: Loons 2, Austin 1

Until Lod's goal, Stuver rejected several scoring chances, often with a single outstretched hand. He stopped Loons forward Franco Fragapane twice, deflecting a shot over the crossbar in the 11th minute and a rebound off a Micky Tapias corner-kick header Stuver had already saved once.

The only save Dayne St. Clair had to stop before halftime was former Loons midfielder Ethan Finlay's short header in the 45th minute.

Austin star Sebastian Driussi was out because of a hamstring injury. He scored three times in the teams' two meetings last season.

Without Reynoso, the Loons were missing their top free-kick taker. El-Ahmad wants his team to take only in-swinging corner kicks, which on Saturday meant right-footed Jeong took the corner kicks from the left side and left-footed Lod took them from the right side. They had 11 corner kicks in the first half alone.

The Star Tribune did not send the writer of this article to the game. This was written using a broadcast, interviews and other material.