OTTAWA – In an exciting second consolation semifinal, the University of Calgary Dinos pulled off the second upset over the defending national champions in as many days, defeating the Montreal Carabins 2-1 in penalty kicks on Friday afternoon.
"It is tough to bounce back after the emotions of last night and have a short turnaround. Montreal, the defending national champions, are an extremely good team and we went toe-to-toe with them," said Dinos head coach
Troye Flannery. "I am proud of our team because this win makes the tournament relevant for us again. We get to play another game on Sunday."
In a redemptive moment, Montreal defender Mélissa Proulx opened the scoring on her team's first shot, sending home a strike in the 23rd minute. In the Carabins' heartbreaking loss to McMaster on Thursday, it was Proulx who conceded an own-goal, handing the Marauders an upset overtime win.
Just over a minute later, the Carabins had a great chance to extend their lead when Marie-Ève Bernard O'Breham was awarded a penalty shot. Bernard O'Breham's strike was skilfully turned away by Calgary keeper
Lauren Houghton, keeping the score at 1-0.
Despite the early pressure from the RSEQ champions, the Dinos outshot their opponents 11-3 in through the first 45 minutes.
As the second half got underway, blowing snow began to play a factor and stunted the offensive rhythms of both teams. Calgary, continually looking for an equalizer, had a handful of opportunities that could have brought the match back to a stalemate. On two occasions, the Dinos beat the Montreal keeper, only to be turned away by an unforgiving crossbar.
In the later stages of the match, Calgary continued to have better scoring chances, but were thwarted by a crafty Montreal defence. Finally, after relentless pressure in Montreal end, the Dinos evened the score on a lofty strike by defender
Amy Mikuska in the 76th minute.
Calgary's equalizer held up for the remainder of regulation, pushing the match immediately to penalty kicks.
Montreal's first shot was turned away by Houghton, which proved to be the difference-maker in the match. The Dinos scored on each of their kicks to seal the 2-1 win in a thrilling match at Gee-Gees Field.
"We knew we were in for a tough game today," said
Jordan Smith, who was named the Dinos Player of the Game. "Obviously Montreal is a really good team, so we knew we had to be up for it. I think we pushed and got a lot of opportunities. We had an amazing penalty kick save that kept us in the game and then we just kept grinding it out."
"It is important for our program to play against the Montreal's and Laval's and play everyone here and see how we measure up. We are right there and we have a big group of these young women who are coming back to this program next year," added Flannery.
Up next, the Dinos will move on to the consolation final at the 2018 U SPORTS Women's Soccer Championship on Sunday, where they will take the RSEQ finalist Laval Rouge et Or at 8 a.m. MT.
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