Lucas Punkari
The Muskie boys’ soccer team is headed to the all-Ontarios for the third-straight year after beating the Kenora Broncos 2-1 in the NorWOSSA final yesterday afternoon in Dryden.
“This just shows you the dedication that the kids have,” Muskie head coach Shane Beckett said afterwards.
“They get involved in the summer and work together on the same team during the off-season, and those things show when it comes to the season itself,” he noted.
“When the guys get out onto the field, they have already had about 16 or so games under their belts, and that just shows the hard work the guys all put in.”
Cam Gobeil and Tyler Ruppenstein scored for the Muskies in the final—a match where the black-and-gold dominated possession for the most of it.
Kodai Kuroda netted the lone goal for the Broncos, who advanced to the final after beating the Dryden Eagles in a wild 4-3 semi-final clash earlier in the day.
The Muskies now will head to Stratford for the OFSAA ‘AA’ boys’ championship June 6-8.
“Our goal is to make the playoffs this time around,” Gobeil said.
“We got our first win at OFSAA last year, so this year we would like to step our game up and make it out of our group,” he added.
The Muskie girls, meanwhile, saw their season come to an end in the semi-final yesterday, dropping a thrilling 2-1 extra-time affair to the host Eagles.
With the game seeming headed for penalty kicks, Amy Doudiet raced down the field with only a minute to go and booted the ball past Muskie keeper Nicole Horn to send the black-and-gold home.
“Our goal is to always be the best team on the last day of the season, and we were playing our best soccer,” noted head coach Sarah Faragher.
“I was happy with how the team played, but it just didn’t work out for us today,” she sighed.
Doudiet also scored the game-tying goal near halftime after Maryam Seid had put the Muskies on the board on a free kick early in the game.
“I had just got hit by one of their player before that, and she received a yellow card as a result and we got a free kick out of it,” Seid recalled.
“Another player wanted to take it, but I just really felt that the kick was a result of what had happened to me, plus I was really mad so I wanted to kick it,” she reasoned.
“I was just aiming for the far corner, and it went right where I wanted it.”
Kenora went on to capture their fourth-straight league title later in the day, edging the Eagles 1-0 after prevailing 6-5 on penalty kicks.
The Broncos now will represent NorWOSSA at the OFSAA ‘AA’ championships June 6-8 in Tecumseh.
