VANCOUVER – After a gritty and closely contested affair the No. 10 UBC Thunderbirds (0-0-1) and No. 2 Trinity Western Spartans (0-0-1) settled for a 0-0 draw to open their Canada West seasons on a sunny Friday evening at Thunderbird Stadium.

The home side had a great opportunity to open the scoring with a flurry of chances in the eighth minute as defender Sophie Damian played a great ball into the TWU area. Following a Danielle Steer flick on the T-Birds collapsed on the bouncing ball three-yards off the Spartans goal line but the visitors did well to block the multiple UBC scoring attempts.

The Spartans earned a chance in the 40^th minute after a through ball from the backline awkwardly bounced through a pair of UBC defenders and sent forward Kathryn Harvey in alone, but she sent her shot high prior to halftime.
 

?? WSOC | After the first half of play still locked at 0-0 between @ubcwsoc and @TWUwsoc at Thunderbird stadium pic.twitter.com/mfsCN0YGi1

— UBC Thunderbirds / @UBCTBirds (@ubctbirds) September 7, 2019

The second half was similar to the first in that UBC came out flying in the first 10 minutes but were unable to get much going forward. In the 67^th, a TWU free kick found the head of centre back Elizabeth Hicks who's chance was well saved by Emily Moore. In the 76^th the home side would counter as forward Danielle Steer did well to work down the sidelines and play a great ball in to Michelle Jang, who's header was well saved by Spartans keeper Hannah Miller to keep it scoreless. Both teams would not have much more offensive opportunities to finish off the game as both defences held strong.

Post game, UBC head coach Jesse Symons was pleased with his teams' performance. "I felt as the game wore on we took control and had some good chances that their keeper saved well, first game of the year and still lots of soccer to play, but overall for a first match I think we played well".



With a lot of new faces in his lineup, he commented on their performances and was complimentary of his teams' togetherness as well. "From the beginning we have had a very good attitude and mindset to play for each other". Also going on to say, "Overall our senior players on the backline led the way for us tonight and it was huge for us to shutout a team of this calibre".

UBC are back at home Saturday at 6:30 p.m. PT against another tough division team in the Fraser Valley Cascades.