By: SAM BORDEN

The ball was barely past United States goalkeeper Tim Howard, and already he had put his hands to his head. On the bench, Jurgen Klinsmann spun away as if he had seen a ghost. Up the field, not far from where he lost the ball, Michael Bradley could only stare.

This was what shock looked like. The Americans had advanced, hadn’t they?

Hadn’t they?

The celebration had been epic after Clint Dempsey, the captain, the man with the black eye and the broken nose and the swollen cheek, scored just nine minutes from the end to put the Americans in front and surely — surely — into the knockouts. It was bedlam. It was overwhelming. It was historic.

But then, suddenly, the lead was gone. This US team will not be the first to advance to the Round of 16 after just two group-stage games. It will not get to skate in its final Group G game, against Germany. It will not get to relax.

Instead, it will live on the precipice between success and failure for another day. That was the cost of two lapses on Sunday — one at the beginning of the game and one, brutally, at the end — that allowed Portugal to salvage a 2-2 tie at the Arena da Amazonia. Half a minute more, and the United States would have had a victory that guaranteed advancement. Now, the math is suddenly murkier.

“Football is cruel sometimes,” Howard said.

It is. Yet despite the collective gut punch that the United States endured here, the situation is not dire. A victory against Germany on Thursday in Recife would be ideal, allowing the US to top the group. A loss would leave the Americans possibly needing to win a tiebreaker with Portugal or Ghana. A tie would also put them through, in second place behind Germany.

Poor start

Things started poorly for the US, as a bad miscue from defender Geoff Cameron allowed Nani to give Portugal an early lead. The mistake did not cause the Americans to crumble, though, and they largely had the better of play before Jermaine Jones finally levelled the score in the 64th minute with a whistling shot from nearly 30 yards out.

That goal had the US in position for a tie, but the Americans wanted more, and, about 20 minutes later, Graham Zusi crossed the ball off a broken play. Dempsey was lurking in front of the net, and he turned the ball over the line.

After watching Dempsey finish with his stomach, Klinsmann exploded, running up and down the sideline. The outcome seemed unbelievable: The US, expected to crash out of Group G, was on the verge of being the first team to advance.

But it was not to be. Deep into added time, Ronaldo — who had largely been neutralized by a crowded midfield — finally found a bit of space. Bradley lost the ball near the sideline, and Ronaldo seized upon the opening, swinging in a perfect cross that Silvestre Varela, a Portugal forward, barreled past Howard with a powerful header.