Lucas Punkari
In the nine years that Shane Beckett has been in charge of the Muskie boys’ soccer team, the black-and-gold always has been the bridesmaid at the annual St. John-Ravenscourt soccer tournament in Winnipeg.
But Sunday afternoon, the Muskies finally came away with a trophy, edging the Glenlawn Lions of Winnipeg 2-1 in the ‘B’-side final.
“We end up in the ‘B’-side final there often enough, but we have never been able to win it,” Beckett noted.
“This is a huge positive for the boys to win this, especially with how tough our pool was as Vincent Massey won the ‘A’-title and River East won the ‘C’-title,” he added.
“And this is also gives our team a lot of confidence heading into the [NorWOSSA] regular season.”
After a scoreless first half, the Lions went up 1-0 about 10 minutes into the second half. But the Muskies struck back with a pair of goals in a five-minute span from Brandon Sinclair and Gavin Moorhouse to take a lead they would not relinquish.
“After we got the lead, we spent the remaining time keeping our system the same and we worked in trying to keep them at bay,” Beckett recalled.
“We were able to do that.
“And even when they started to adjust their systems and had three attackers coming in, we were still able to hold them off,” he added.
The Muskies advanced to the ‘B’-side final thanks to a 2-0 victory over the Fort Richmond Centurions (Winnipeg) in the semi-finals Saturday afternoon, with Brandon McGinnis and Colton Craig doing the scoring.
“They [Fort Richmond] were a very skilled team, but they didn’t play as well as a team as their skill level would indicate,” Beckett said.
“We took it to them the whole game and ended up doubling them in shots on target.
“And while it wasn’t a cruising victory, we worked hard to get the win,” he stressed.
The Muskies had opened round-robin play Friday with a dramatic 1-0 extra time triumph over the eventual tournament champion Vincent Massey Trojans (Winnipeg).
Colton Spicer scored a highlight-reel “golden goal” to give Fort High the victory.
“It was a wicked goal that he [Spicer] scored as he came in off of the left side and put it right in the top corner of the net,” Beckett enthused.
“We did some research afterwards and found out that they [Vincent Massey] were the silver-medalists at the Manitoba provincials last year, so as a coaching staff, we were really happy with that result,” he added.
Fort High could have advanced to the ‘A’-side playoffs with a win or a draw in their final round-robin game Saturday morning, but they fell 2-1 to the River East Kodiaks (Winnipeg) to drop down to the ‘B’-side semi-finals.
“That loss was a real heart-breaker,” Beckett admitted.
“We gave up a penalty kick in the last seconds of the game,” he noted. “It was something that the referee had let go for the entire game, and he ended up calling it late in the match and it cost us.”
Spicer had the lone Muskie goal.
Beside the goal scorers, one of Fort High’s top performers over the weekend was defender Sam Berube, who was awarded for his efforts by being named to the tournament all-star team.
“Sam was all over the field all weekend, and he was unbelievable in controlling the midfield and shutting down a lot of their attacks,” Beckett said.
“I can’t think of one huge save that [keeper] Scott [Parsons] had to make all weekend because our defensive systems were able to shut them down, and Sam was in charge of quarterbacking that,” he explained.
With the ‘B’-side title in Winnipeg, coming on the heels of a 6-0 thrashing over the Rainy River Owls in an exhibition tilt here last Tuesday, Beckett is liking the progress his team is making heading into the opening day of the NorWOSSA regular season next Wednesday at Fort High.
“Defensively, we are looking really good as we only gave up two goals in regular play this weekend, and we also saw the flow in our attack starting to come together,” he noted.
“We will be working on our first touch a little bit in practice, and also try to improve on our attacking with pace as when we start to slow down a bit, that’s when the other teams take advantage and we start to get into trouble,” he warned.
The Muskies will begin their quest to repeat as NorWOSSA champs when they take on the Dryden Eagles next Wednesday at 10 a.m.
Then they’ll square off against the Kenora Broncos at 4 p.m.
