Women fall short of medal round despite solid showing
If the men’s indoor soccer team was going to relinquish their title, they weren’t going to go down without a fight. That was exactly how it all unfolded in the Ontario Colleges Athletic Association (OCAA) championship match at Redeemer University College on March 24.
The Huskies, who came into the tournament as the defending champions, found themselves on the wrong end of a 1-0 decision to Humber College. The winning goal came midway through the second half on a free kick from tournament MVP Bradley Fenton. George Brown College (GBC) pressed in the final 10 minutes but couldn’t find the equalizer.
“I’d say we had the better of the chances,” said Huskies head coach John Williams. “We fell asleep for one set play with a free kick—and you should never get scored on in indoor on a free kick—so, somebody lost their concentration, never stepped up on time and the ball ended up in the back of the net.”
The Huskies went 3-1 in the round-robin, outscoring their opponents 10-5 before pulling out a victory over Seneca College in the semi-finals thanks to a late goal by Omar Hussein. Captain Jesse Oliver and striker Shaquille Agard were named to the Tournament All-Star team.
Agard reflected on the team’s two-year run of success.
“This year I felt like we went in with more confidence and we got a little complacent at times because we knew how good we were whereas last year we didn’t know that we could do it and we did it,” Agard said. “For next year, I can’t really say because there’s a few players leaving, but it’s going to be the same structure. I feel like it will be successful the same way.”
On the women’s side, the Huskies opened strong with a 2-0 win over Durham College. However, a tie and two losses, both of which came against the two eventual finalists (Humber College and Seneca) were not enough to prevent GBC from advancing to the medal round.
A lack of offence proved to be the club’s downfall as the Huskies only managed three goals in four matches. Despite not getting a medal, their coach was pleased with the effort.
“We outplayed every team there,” said Williams. “There’s not a team that we played against that can tell us that they were really better than us. I think those games came down to just missed opportunity.”
