Submitted by Brendon Ritchie
The Vikings Men's Soccer team continued to train on Sunday mornings throughout the winter, in preparation for the upcoming ACAC Futsal events. The Vikings played in two preliminary tournaments, one in Three Hils and the other in Olds. The players worked hard, still adjusting to the rules of Futsal, which are a change for both the players and coaching staff.
In Three Hills, we played well - winning two games, but losing two games as well which knocked us out of the tournament.
In Olds, we played against the SAIT Trojans Red squad and lost 4-2, a very tough game with both teams working hard. Our next opponent that day was the Medicine Hat College Rattlers, a quality team and they beat us 6-2. Once again the Vikings worked hard but ran into fouling problems. Next up were The King's University Eagles. The Eagles played a very strong game, scoring early. The Vikings came back and scored twice before the Eagles scored twice to go into the half time with a 3-2 lead. The second half was dominated by the Eagles as the Vikings were caught with one player less on the bench due to a player being ejected from the game earlier. This was the final game of the tournament for the Vikings, having not advanced to the playoff round.
The ACAC Futsal Championship saw the Vikings travel to Lloydminister, with the Championship tournament hosted by Lakeland College. Our first game was against The King's University Eagles who were very sharp in the game and won it 4-0. The second game against Olds was a good game by two teams trying to make the play offs. The Vikings scored first and then Olds scored twice before the half. The second half started and the Vikings scored again to tie the game up. Unfortunately, Olds came back and scored to take the lead once again. They scored their final goal on a penalty kick and walked away as the winners. The last game of the tournament was against the Medicine Hat College Rattlers. They advanced to the final by beating us. They scored off of a penalty kick, a free kick and a corner kick. We headed for home but we had achieved our goal and had given a better performance this year than last. Everything closed down for us after the tournament. The Team is looking forward to next season with official team training set to start on August 11, 2018.