Birds of a feather flock together and the University of British Columbia Thunderbirds certainly flocked to a 1-0 loss under the mighty wrath of our Dinos women’s soccer squad Sat., Sept. 25. As the University of Calgary Facilities team finally got their act together, bleachers, stands and admission tables were setup at the game for what turned out to be quite a sizable home-team crowd. Our ladies took on last year’s Canada West champs. The DJ/PA announcer however, still sucked.
Like an insurance salesman at a baby shower, the Thunderbirds pestered the Dinos throughout the scoreless first half. Despite a slight edge in attack from the UBC gals, the Dinos kept morale high. Charlotte “Shut-out” Sullivan came up big again and again as she brick-walled the futile attempts, proving that her zero goals against average is certainly no fluke.
During the intermission, a lone UBC fan shouted “go T-Birds!” revealing the team’s nickname. Now, when I hear T-Birds, I think of T-Bars which is also a nickname for a form of sparse women’s (and some European men’s) undergarments. Like T-Bars, the T-Birds were also quite sparse–when it came to defense. During the second half of the match the Dinos opened up the shooting gallery.
After fancy footwork from Christa Cairns and close chances from the talented Hunter sisters, the goose egg finally broke as Calgary mid Jess Horning unleashed a “hot” cross to Stephanie Hoogveld who tapped it past a distraught UBC goalkeeper. This marked the only tally of the match and as time wound down so did the hopes of the T-birds as the Dinos held the iron-fist defense and closed out yet another shutout win.
In defeating UBC, our ladies have moved up to the number eight spot on the Canadian top ten list. The T-Birds hadn’t lost in their last 20 regular season and playoff games.
The Dinos are heading on a three game road trip as they take on the Trinity Western University Spartans on Thu., Sept. 30, UBC again on Sat., Oct. 2 and the University of Victoria Vikes on Sun., Oct. 3.