Pronghorn soccer teams drop season openers

By Lethbridge Herald on August 29, 2022.

Herald photo by JUSTIN SEWARD University of Lethbridge Pronghorn Alexis Bradford tries to defend against Mount Royal University Cougars’ Isabella Chirico during the first half Canada West action at Community Stadium on Saturday.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The University of Lethbridge Pronghorn soccer teams did not get the results they were looking for on opening weekend of Canada West play.

The women’s team lost 6-2 to the Mount Royal Cougars on home turf on Saturday afternoon.

The Cougars opened the scoring in the sixth minute and then added  to their lead at the 26th minute to get out to an early 2-0 lead and then scored three goals in a seven-minute span of  the second half after Lethbridge tied the game at two.

MRU would solidify the win in the 72nd minute with their sixth goal

Kayleigh Harris scored the Horns first goal at 33:20 in the first half and  Hailey Slobodian tied the game at two in the second half at 57:20.

“We didn’t start well in the first half,” said coach Macky Singh, women’s head coach.

“ But you know MRU quickly got to two mill and then we managed to claw back one just before half time to make it 2-1. We regrouped in the second half… and we set it off strong and scored and equalized and a good feeling kind of thing knowing that we can come from being goals down to come and equalize and kind of push on. Unfortunately we didn’t get the chance to push on and MRU kind of pushed on.”

Singh said it set up a learning curve for a lot of  players.

“We’ve got a lot of first years,” he said.

“It was the first time playing in that wind for a lot of our players. For three weeks of training camp, not a single wind, and then it decides to come up yesterday.”

Singh thinks the girls can be a little quicker on ball pressure and more physicality on the ball.

The rematch is set for Wednesday in Calgary at 6 p.m.

As for the men’s squad, they lost 3-0 to the University of Saskatchewan Huskies.

“I actually think it wasn’t necessarily as bad as it looks,” said men’s coach Davin Haigh.

“I think the guys tried to implement our new philosophy. Obviously with a new coach, there’s going to be new expectations and with that there’s going to be new pressures they put on themselves. It was evident in the first half. It took us a while to try and settle nerves, never mind just even playing soccer in general. But the boys showed a lot of courage.”

The first half did not go as planned as the Huskies scored two goals off of Pronghorn turnovers and the second half saw them get one goal.

“So there was improvement and we created three chances that I think on another given day the boys would have capitalized on them,” said Haigh.

U of L will look get in the win column as they host MacEwan University on Friday, 5 p.m., at Community Stadium.