CARSON — In need of a big response, the Galaxy replied with the loudest.

Trailing Austin FC in the second half of Sunday’s game at Dignity Health Sports Park, the Galaxy (7-5-2, 23 points) scored four goals, with two from Dejan Joveljic, for a 4-1 win in front of 20,433.

Joveljić, who last month said he needed more playing time, turned in a game’s worth performance in less than 30 minutes of playing time. He also had two assists and also picked up a yellow card.

After Javier “Chicharito” Hernandez tied the game in the 61st minute, Joveljić gave the Galaxy the lead in the 64th and he added his second in the 79th minute.

Joveljić said he received simple instructions from the coaching staff before entering the game. He replaced Samuel Grandsir in the 57th minute.

“They told me to close down No. 6 (Daniel Pereira) and to bring some energy and to score some goals,” Joveljic said.

Mission Accomplished.

“Every time he comes in off of the bench, he’s scored a goal, had a goal called back, assist, he’s made a difference,” Galaxy coach Greg Vanney said. “He’s brought energy, he’s brought confidence, he’s brought quality in the final action. His opportunities are coming and in starts hopefully he can do the same thing and do it for large stretches of time.”

The last two home games within league play haven’t been kind the Galaxy. In losses this month to FC Dallas and Houston, the Galaxy have been outscored 6-1.

Austin FC opened the scoring in the 53rd minute on a goal by Diego Fagundez. Allowing the first goal has shaken the Galaxy from its plan in recent games, but that wasn’t the case this time.

“The discussion at halftime was again to make sure that we work through the transitions and once we secured the ball we could rest with the ball a little bit if we needed to,” Vanney said. “But as to choose our moments wisely in the attacking and trying to score goals.”

The Galaxy nearly had two goals in the first half. However, Hernandez failed to convert a penalty kick in the third minute and in the 38th minute, Hernandez scored, but the goal was disallowed by VAR due to a handball on Hernandez.

“After I score, the next play is the most important one,” Hernandez said. “If you score, it’s done and the next one should be the most important one. If you miss a penalty, doesn’t matter, the next one should be more important. You have to keep going until the last whistle.”

Hernandez got his moment in the 57th minute. Julian Araujo crossed to Joveljić, who had quick back-flick into space that Hernandez soon filled and deposited into the back of the net to make it 1-1.

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“As quick as you can let go every play, then you can take everything in a positive and into your advantage and that’s you can become resilient and overcome a lot of obstacles, like today,” Hernandez said. “That’s a great team. We missed chances, we missed a PK, VAR, they scored first, but it didn’t matter for us, we just kept going, kept going, kept going and the end result was amazing.”

In the 90th minute, Joveljić unleashed a bicycle kick pass toward Alvarez, who went ahead and beat Brad Stuver to make it 4-1.

Joveljić now has six goals in across all competitions for the Galaxy, with three each in the U.S. Open Cup and now in MLS games.

“He shows his quality in front of the goal and also just some cleverness on the assists, both assists were quite clever,” Vanney said of Joveljić. “This is the young man we thought we were getting, who scores goals and for us now is to keep finding opportunities for him to continue to grow as a player.”