CALGARY – Following a dominant 3-0 win in the Canada West bronze medal game this past Saturday in Vancouver, the University of Calgary Dinos women's soccer team is off to Quebec City this week for the U SPORTS Women's Soccer Championship, starting Thursday.
The Dinos were seeded seventh in this year's draw and will play second-seeded Montreal Thursday in the opening game of the tournament at 9 a.m. MT from host Laval's Telus Stadium.
Thursday's result will then determine when Calgary will play on Friday, with an additional potential game set for either Saturday or Sunday.
FIVE THINGS TO KNOW
1. How We Got Here – The Dinos turned in an impressive 9-3-2 record in the regular season to finish third in the Canada West Pacific Division with 29 points – just one point shy of second place. In their postseason opener at Alberta, the Dinos flipped a 1-0 deficit into a 2-1 lead late only to see the Pandas tie it back up. But,
Sofia DiGiacomo headed home the game-winner in stoppage time to send the Scarlet & Gold to the Final Four. Calgary opened the Final Four against host UBC with a loss before bouncing back in a big way just one day later.
Rachel Barlow scored a PK in the 20th minute and added another in the run of play in the 51st before assisting on
Jayden Berg's blast in the 79th for a 3-0 win to claim CW bronze and punch their ticket to nationals.
2. Matchup History – Being separated by over 3,000 kilometres, it makes sense the Dinos and Carabins don't have much history between them. In fact, the two programs have only squared off once before, meeting in the consolation semifinals of the 2018 U SPORTS Championship, held that year in Ottawa. Calgary knocked off the defending national champs in that matchup in penalty kicks. While both programs have continued their success since that meeting, the Dinos have almost an entirely new roster since that game, with only one player (
Sofia Mondaca) from that game still on this year's roster. Meanwhile, four starters and five total Montreal players from that 2018 contest are still on this year's squad, including Erika Bastien, who started in goal and made 13 saves back in 2018 and now is listed as a forward with two goals and four assists this season.
3. History At Nationals – Calgary is off to nationals for the sixth time in program history and the fourth time in the last seven years. Here's the list of the previous performances by the Dinos on the national stage:
- 1998 – National Champions
- 2005 – Fourth Place
- 2015 – Seventh Place
- 2018 – Sixth Place
- 2019 – National Runners-Up
4. Postseason Awards – Several players on this year's team have been recognized for their efforts on the field, before the U SPORTS awards announcement. Four Dinos were named to the Canada West All-Star teams.
Rachel Barlow earned first-team honours after amassing six goals and a U SPORTS-high 11 assists in the regular season.
Sofia DiGiacomo was named a second-teamer after racking up four goals and two assists from the back in conference play. And
Erica Mysko and
Mykena Walker were both selected to the conference's all-rookie squad, as Mysko tallied five goals and two assists, while Walker added one goal and three assists as a wing back.
5. Quotable – "We've got to learn from this weekend and continue to get better from this weekend," Dinos co-coach
Diogo Raposo said after the CW bronze-medal game. "When you get (to nationals), it's anyone's game on any day and you need a little bit of luck. You need to concentrate. But why not us? We don't want to go to nationals just to go to nationals. We want to compete, we want to do more than that."
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