Despite enjoying much of the possession, the UBC Thunderbirds were held to a scoreless draw against the Canada West leading University of Calgary Dinos in an entertaining affair Friday night at Thunderbird Stadium.
Both teams came into the game boasting two of the stingiest defences in the Conference. Calgary, tied for first with just five goals against, meanwhile the T-Birds were third having given up eight.
The home side carried the play in the first half an hour building to UBC midfielder
Tess McRae receiving a pass down the right wing, then playing a great ball into the Calgary area that found
Danielle Steer, but her header went wide of the goal in the 34
th minute. In the 40
th minute, Calgary responded with a dangerous opportunity as Sienna Prince-McPherson laid the ball into the path of leading scorer Montana Leonard who put herself into a great position, pushing her right footed shot wide to the left of
Emily Moore and the game remained knotted at 0-0 into halftime
UBC had a flurry of chances to start the second half, as 15 minutes past the interval another great McCrae ball found
Katalin Tolnai who's shot dangerously rolled past the goal line of the Dinos and wide. The best-looking Calgary chance in the second half came off the foot of Kelsie MacDonald, who had a go from distance but UBC keeper
Emily Moore was equal to the task.
The T-Birds would push late to find the winner just before the 70
th minute, Tolnai was influential yet again as her left footed shot found the post. 15 minutes later, Tolnai once again laid a good ball to rookie forward
Vanessa Tome whose left footed shot went wide of the goal as the game finished scoreless.
"Full credit to the team tonight," said UBC head coach
Jesse Symons post game. "From back to front it was fantastic, our young players were solid as well against a dynamic Calgary offence. For the most part I thought it was a tight game with a bit of a playoff feel but I thought we were unlucky not to get one in the second half as the game opened up slightly."
Prior to kick off the T-Birds recognized their four graduating seniors,
Natasha Klasios,
Amelia Crawford, Leisanne Musico and
Marisa Mastropieri who were all a part of the starting eleven.
"Some big congratulations to our four seniors who had big night's," added Symons. "I thought Marisa was fantastic out of the back, Amelia, Liesanne and Natasha also had great games and we're playing for them."
UBC concludes their season Saturday, hosting the UNBC Timberwolves for a 5:00 p.m. kickoff at Ken Woods field. The Dinos, meanwhile cross the water to Victoria to visit the Vikes, also kicking off at 5:00 p.m. on Saturday.
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