Colts lose out in OCAA soccer finals
The Centennial Colts women’s indoor soccer team finished their season in spirited, but disappointing fashion, finishing with an 0-3 record at the 2009 OCAA Women’s Indoor Soccer Championship held at the OSA Soccer Centre in Vaughan from March 26th to the 27th.
In the team’s first match up, Coach Diarmuid O’Connor’s squad lost 3-0 to the Fanshawe College Falcons. Fanshawe, whose team consists of only two players not in their first year of college, went on to defeat the Durham College Lords in penalty kicks the following day to advance to the championship.
In their second tilt of the first day, the Colts lost 2-1 to the Fleming Knights. After jumping out to an early 1-0 lead, the team could not ride the momentum gained from that tally to hold on to the win.
“We shouldn’t have lost the second game,” O’Connor said. “We were up one, they tied it, and then we had to push up. We needed to win the second game to move on.”
In game three, the Colts were up against the dominant Humber Hawks, whose team consisted of four OCAA All-Stars, one of which was the OCAA Rookie of the Year and two who tied for the OCAA scoring crown. The Colts lost 3-0 to the eventual OCAA Champions, who defeated Fanshawe 2-0 in the next day’s final.
Though they failed to advance into the second day of the tournament, Coach O’Connor said he was proud of the way the women performed, considering they were missing one of their key players.
“We went in with one of our captains out due to a job interview in Hamilton that was happening the same day,” he said. “There wasn’t much we could do about that situation, and the girls who played all showed a lot of spirit despite that fact.”
The team is planning to stick with it this summer. Based out of Ajax, they will be competing together in the Ontario Women’s Soccer League in hopes of building on the successes of this past season.
