VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds got their 2026 Canada West men's soccer season off to a winning start on Thursday evening at Thunderbird Stadium with a 2-0 victory over the visiting University of Fraser Valley Cascades.
The first half was a tale of two penalties, with
Max Comsia firing UBC ahead from the spot before Mateo Brazinha was denied by a superb double save by Thunderbirds keeper
Roko Vukic.
Sebastian Agerskov scored his first goal as a Thunderbird with nine minutes remaining, with a lovely individual effort to put the game to bed. They were able to survive a second UFV penalty at the death, with Brazinha crashing his shot off the bar, to record their first victory of the year with a very solid performance.
"We played the way we want to play," UBC head coach
Mike Mosher said after the match. "Sometimes with UFV you can get pulled into a fight. We want to play our game as much as we can. I thought we did, and we established that from the beginning. We were quite good and full value for the win.
"We could and should have had more, and that would have put it to bed a bit sooner, but a couple of errors to give up two penalties. Bravo to Roko on the first, great save, then I guess he's in Mateo's head a little bit with the second one. We've got to look a little bit at those, but on the whole, lots of positives. Really good performance for game one."
UBC controlled much of the first half play, but their excellent build-up work was just lacking the final execution.
A fast-passing move in the 20th minute saw Comsia clipped in the box as he quickly released a pass and the referee had no hesitation in pointing to the spot. Comsia picked himself up to take the penalty, sending Matheus De Souza the wrong way, and the Thunderbirds had their breakthrough.
UFV had an almost immediate chance to level things up less than two minutes later when a streaking Marcus D'Andrea was brought down in the box for the Cascades to get a penalty of their own.
Brazinha's kick was superbly denied by Vukic, who got down to his right then reacted quickly to pounce on the rebound before the 2025 U SPORTS Player of the Year could get on to it.
Eric Kim was denied by a near-post save from De Souza in the 32nd minute, but goal-scoring chances in the first half were at a premium for both sides.
UFV started the second half on the front foot, with Brazinha having a couple of looks on goal within the first five minutes of the restart.
The teams cancelled themselves out for much of the rest of the half, but UBC found the crucial second they had been looking for in the 81st minute when Agerskov showed great determination to make room to get off his shot, which he buried low into the far corner.
To their credit, UFV kept fighting till the final whistle, with Dante Colebourne bringing a save out of Vukic with a header from a corner in stoppage time, before the Cascades were given their second penalty of the match in the last few seconds. Brazinha stepped up once again, but this time he crashed his effort off the bar and over.
A good first outing for the Thunderbirds, as UBC head into the new campaign ranked number one nationally in the U SPORTS preseason rankings. Next up is a trip to Langley to take on Trinity Western Spartans on Saturday evening, with the teams facing off back in Vancouver on Wednesday, September 2nd.
