FREDERICTON - The UBC Thunderbirds scored three unanswered goals in the second half in snowy conditions to defeat the Laval Rouge et Or 3-1 and win back-to-back CIS national titles Sunday afternoon at BMO Field in Fredericton, N.B.
The Thunderbirds have now won a CIS record 13 men's soccer CIS championships and are the first program to win back-to-back titles since Wilfrid Laurier in 2000-01.
BOX SCORE
Down 1-0 after the opening 45 minutes, UBC came out in the second half as a team possessed. They wasted little time scoring the equalizer as
Niall Cousens scored his first of the championship tournament six minutes into the half making it 1-1.
Just over 10 minutes later,
Milad Mehrabi scored in the 62nd minute to give the Thunderbirds their first lead of the day and then two minutes later
Navid Mashinchi iced the game with a beauty finish to put UBC in front by two, 3-1.
"We are a confident bunch and we were very calm at the half," said UBC's Cousens. "Mike and Dave had some good words for us and we had the confidence that we could come out and score a couple of goals and that is just what we did."
"We wound them up a bit at the half," said UBC head coach
Mike Mosher. "We had the confidence knowing we had scored so many goals during the regular season. We could just sense in the first couple of minutes of the second half that the momentum started to swing. There was a little bit of blood in the water and the sharks got after it."
The Rouge et Or, who were so strong in the first half, had no answer for UBC and would have to settle for the silver medal.
Laval opened up the scoring in the 33rd minute on a great shot from Amaury Fauvergue to give the Rouge et Or a 1-0 lead through 45 minutes of play.
Mosher has now won eight national titles with the Thunderbirds, four as a head coach, three as a player, and one as an assistant coach.
"Winning doesn't get old," said Mosher. "Every time is better than the last and to go back-to-back is a pretty sweet feeling."
Mosher has continued a long tradition of excellence at UBC as the Thunderbirds have now won an impressive 13 men's soccer titles.
"The culture was laid along time ago by Joe Johnson, my father (Dick Mosher), Dave Partridge, the players that I played with, and the guys who played before that," said Mosher. "That's a winning culture and that is the expectation here. The bar has been raised very high and it is up to the boys to strive to that level."
The 2013 championship tournament played out exactly the same way as in 2007 when the Thunderbirds won. They defeated Montreal in the quarter-final, York in the semi-final, and Laval in the final.
Cousens was named the tournament MVP and was joined by
Paul Clerc and
Milad Mehrabi on the all-tournament team.
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