After a slow start, the Lake City Falcons senior boys soccer team finished strong at the B.C. AAA Provincial Soccer Championships.
The Falcons finished with a record of two wins and three losses to place 13th out of 16 teams at the tournament, held in Burnaby from Nov. 26-28.
Lake City Secondary School lost its first game to Burnaby Central, 8-0. Burnaby Central wound up third in the tournament.
“The first game was an adjustment for the players to get used to the speed of playing at the AAA soccer level,” said Falcons head coach Brian Hansen. “Lots of very fast and skilled players.
“After that, we continued to improve in every game.”
The Falcons then fell 2-0 to Sullivan Heights (8th overall) and 6-1 to Princess Margaret (10th overall) before putting together a pair of wins to end the tournament.
“In the second game we lost 2-0 but could have won, as well, and were unlucky not to finish a few chances,” he said. “Game three we made a few changes to generate a little more offence and while the result was not what we wanted, our play became more offensive.”
In the team’s fourth game the Falcons won an exciting shootout victory, 1-0, against Vancouver’s Lord Byng secondary. They then shutout another Vancouver school, David Thompson, 3-0, to wrap up the tournament.
“Game four was won in an exciting shootout requiring six shooters from each team,” Hansen said. “In the last game we were clearly the better team and put in a great work effort.”
Hansen said every player deserves full credit for their efforts and should be proud of how they represented their school this year.
“It was a real pleasure for dragon Jukic and myself to coach the team this year,” he said. “We had a really good time.”
Dr. Charles Best of Coquitlam won the championship after defeating Argyle of North Vancouver in the tournament final.