QUEBEC CITY – A Megane Sauve goal in the third minute of play stood up for the Montreal Carabins in a 1-0 win over the Calgary Dinos women's soccer team Thursday in the opening quarterfinal match of the 2022 U SPORTS women's soccer championship presented by Ocean Group at the TELUS-Universite Laval Stadium in Quebec City.

The Dinos continued to press for the equalizer all game, but just couldn't quite break down the Carabins defence that has only allowed five goals all season.

"We're young and we're going to learn from these moments," Dinos co-head coach Diogo Raposo said. "The experience we're getting now for the next three, four, five years will be huge. We're playing with seven or eight first years from an experience point of view. We're learning on the job. I've said it before, that's not an excuse for us, but it is the reality. We've got another game tomorrow. We want to make sure we excel on the field and we continue to get better every day."

Montreal – who returned four starters and five players from the 2019 nationals showdown with the Dinos – were able to find the back of the net on the game's first chance. Maxyme Nobert sent a brilliant through ball and Sauve perfectly timed her run behind the defence to just avoid the offside flag. Sauve one-timed her shot past the on-coming Dinos keeper and it was 1-0 just 2:18 into the game.

"That has been our Achilles heel this year a little bit with some poor starts, at times. But our response was great," Raposo said. "It's tough when you go down because then you're always chasing the game. That's never easy. We need to make sure we need to clean that up, obviously for tomorrow, but also just in the future. We need to make sure that we're on top in the first five or ten minutes and then we can relax and have a bit of poise on the ball instead of chasing the game."

While the Carabins continued to pressure with the early momentum, Calgary keeper Caley Leask made two great saves to keep the score the same.

Calgary's first chance of the game came on a 45-yard blast on a free kick from Maddy Murray, but Montreal goalie Catherine Langelier was up to the task.

The Dinos increased their attack after the break and nearly had the equalizer right out of halftime on a shot from Brooklyn Colvin, but again Langelier was able to make the save.

Continuing to probe their way to try to break down the staunch Carabins back line, Calgary made one final push at the net with a pair of chances in stoppage time but couldn't quite connect on the equalizer before the final whistle blew.

Leask was named the player of the game for the Dinos in the loss, being credited with six saves.

"(Caley's) been great. She made some big saves when we needed her," Raposo said. "We'd obviously like to get one for her so we're not losing this game…but that's the reality of being a goalkeeper. It's tough. You can be the player of the game and sometimes that happens in a loss and that's not a great feeling, but she'd rather have the win than having the player of the game, for sure."

Calgary will now move on to the consolation semifinals, where they will take on a familiar foe in Trinity Western, who lost its opener 1-0 to Ottawa Thursday. The two teams will square off Friday at 9 a.m. MT.

-UC-