Mississauga, ON – On Sunday October 25th, the Western Mustangs played their two last games of the regular season against the Toronto Varsity Blues and the Queen’s Gales. The Mustangs only needed to win one of the two games to move up third place in the OUA.
The Mustangs started off strong against Toronto scoring within the first 10 minutes of the game. Jenn Bruce (Kitchener, ON) shot the ball far post for a tip by Michelle Weber (Ilderton, ON). However, Western couldn’t maintain their lead with the Blues scoring a few minutes later off a short corner. At the end of the second half the Blues had a 2-1 lead. During the second half Toronto scored once more to increase their lead to 3-1 and the Mustangs couldn’t regain their lead.
Head Coach Jeff Pacheco said, “We went away from our game plan and started playing U of T hockey with long balls up the field. Toronto’s goals came from set plays (short corners) so we must focus on being stronger in our defensive areas to avoid giving up corners. They will convert when given many opportunities.”
With the pressure on to get one more win, the Mustangs came out hard against Queen’s. Elsbeth Tate (Richmond, BC) scored two early goals which set the tempo for the rest of the game. By the end of the first half the Mustangs were up 3-0 with Michelle Weber (Ilderton, ON) adding one more goal. Megan Scraper (Vancouver, BC) scored early in the second half to put the final score to 4-0. Queen’s had limited offensive chances and Western’s defense only gave up a few corners. Gillian Cummings (Toronto, ON) and Julia Di Gravio (Waterloo, ON) earned the shutout for the Mustangs. Queen’s struggled with the team’s speed and constant rotation of the forward line.
Jeff Pacheco was very happy with the team’s win commenting that when “the team plays with purpose, we are dangerous. Our style of play is often too much for other teams to defend.”
“I am looking forward to this weekend, Jeff said, but we can’t drop any games on home turf. We play exciting hockey with our speed, ball possession and finishing touch. We should have a solid OUA’s at home if we play our style of hockey all weekend. We virtually sleep at the turf at TD Waterhouse, so we are gunning for an OUA title and CIS berth. “
The Mustangs will face the University of Prince Edward Island on Friday October 30th at 2:00pm at TD Waterhouse. If Western wins they will face Toronto in the semi-finals on Saturday night at 8:00pm. The Mustangs are exactly where they wanted to be going into post season. After losing a tough semi final match to Guelph last year, the team is looking to come out hard and take Toronto out of CIS contention.
