Lakers soccer teams playoff bound

PETERBOROUGH, ON – The road taken to get to the playoffs is different and the locations of the playoffs games will be different however the task of making it to the dance has been accomplished for both the Nipissing Lakers soccer teams.

Sunday, the Lady Lakers (6-7-3) secured home field advantage with a 3-1 victory against Trent University (1-14-1). Leesa Church scored twice and Amy Laidlaw added the insurance marker while Lakers keeper Sam Behm collected the win.

This will mark the first time since 2003 that the Lady Lakers host a playoff game on home soil. The Lady Lakers will face Carleton University a team they tied 1-1 at home during the first week of the season and dropped a 3-1 decision in Ottawa in early October.

“We are very proud of the girls,” said head coach Vito Castiglione. “We won 4 of the last 6 matches and we are now able to host a playoff game at home. We are very excited and eager to play Carleton Wednesday.”

This statement was also echoed by Church who said that this is why they worked so hard all year: the opportunity to play a playoff game in front of our home crowd on our home field. Church also said that the key to victory will be to create some offensive opportunities and continue to play strong team defence.

The sudden death playoff game is scheduled for Wednesday October 28 beginning at 1 p.m. at the Education Centre Field.

On the men’s side the Lakers (2-5-7) made the playoffs with a 0-0 draw against Trent University (3-8-3). The Lakers needed only the draw over Trent to be one point up on the Excalibur to finish 6th in the OUA East division snagging the final playoff spot.

The Lakers jumped out to a strong start creating a quality scoring opportunity in the early moments when Kwadwo Adusei made a nice cross that David Keo fired towards the net however Trent keeper Josip Bosnjak was able to make the diving save to prevent the goal.

In the second half Trent needing the win to advance pressured the Lakers and their best chance came in the 60th minute when Trent’s leading scorer Thaddeus Bolton was sent in on a through ball but Lakers keeper Corey Schwartz came up big making the crucial stop.

The rest of the game was a back and forth affair with both teams playing strong defence and not allowing one and other the opportunity to get quality shots or scoring opportunities.

The Lakers will now travel to the Nations Capital on Wednesday October 23 to face the Carleton Ravens (7-5-2). The Lakers upset the fifth ranked Ravens (at the time) 1-0 during OUA opening weekend action however the Ravens were able to exact some revenge on home turf with a 2-1 victory.

The Lakers game will begin at 2:00 p.m. at Carleton.

Submitted to BayToday.ca