WolfPack wins national title
Tim Petruck – November 13, 2022 / 4:59 p.m. | History: 396068
Photo: TRU
The TRU WolfPack men’s soccer team defeated the UBC Thunderbirds in a shootout Sunday at Hillside Stadium to win the school’s first U Sports national championship.
The Thompson Rivers University WolfPack men’s soccer team earned a hard-fought penalty shootout victory Sunday over the UBC Thunderbirds to capture the school’s first U Sports national championship.
A crowd of 2,400 was on hand at Hillside Stadium to watch the game, many of whom stormed the field after Kamloops product Domenico Comita frozen the game with a goal in the seventh round of the shootout.
“I’m glad we can be the standard bearer and bring this title home because it shows that it can be done in a small school,” TRU head coach John Antulov said after the game.
“I’ve believed from day one when I took office, that just because you’re in a small school doesn’t mean you can’t do it.”
The game was goalless until extra time, when Alesandro Comita, Domenico’s brother, beat UBC goalkeeper Peter Whyte 10 minutes into extra time. The goal was enabled by Jost Hausendorf, who went solo and played a cross that Comita buried.
Daniel Kaiser scored an equalizer for UBC 14 minutes later and TRU, down a man from the 69th minute, held on for a hectic five minutes after that to force penalty kicks.
TRU goaltender Jackson Gardner was stellar at net, making six saves and holding his own on shooting.
“The guys never put their heads down, they just fought and fought. They looked at each other and said: let’s be resilient,” Antulov said.
“We showed dogged defense all the time and for us to defend the way we did with one man down against a team that scores the way they do just shows incredible character.”
Source: news.google.com