Lions beat United to clinch senior title

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This article was published 28/07/2019 (2596 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

YOU can’t win ’em all, but don’t tell the FC Winnipeg Lions that.

On Saturday at the Ralph Cantafio Soccer Complex, the Lions defeated Bonivital United 2-1 to win the senior men’s provincial championship for the seventh time in eight years.

“I gotta be honest, we talk about it every year how we have to lose sooner or later and you never want it to be that year,” Lions head coach Tony Nocita said.

“But we’ve certainly showed resiliency and a real good focus in achieving what we’ve done, so I’m pretty proud of the guys.”

This year’s title marks the fourth in a row for Nocita and his club, but this one came in dramatic fashion.

The match was tied 1-1 as the official announced four minutes of injury time would be added to the clock. Moments later, in the 92nd minute, the Lions took advantage of a corner kick with Adam Hajkowski scoring the winner with a header.

“They battled hard,” said Nocita on Bonivital, who were playing in the finals for the first time. “And I guess maybe I’ll chalk it up to we’ve been there so many times that we just don’t panic in these moments. We just let the game go. We were perfectly prepared to go to overtime if we needed to.”

Overtime wasn’t needed, but flights to St. John’s, N.L., will be as the team will represent the province at the 2019 Toyota National Championships from Oct. 9 to 14.

The Lions will be in Group A with the top teams from British Columbia, Newfoundland and Labrador, Alberta and New Brunswick. The Lions are two years removed from playing in the national championship game against Nova Scotia. Last year, they met Nova Scotia at the nationals again, but it was for seventh place as both teams had a disappointing tournament.

Nocita said it’s tough to compete at the nationals, but he’s confident this year’s team will return to the podium, as he believes this is the most talent they’ve ever had. The Lions also might have some luck on their side as St. John’s was the host city back in 2002 when the Winnipeg team won nationals.

“I can honestly tell you we certainly feel we can win a gold medal,” Nocita said. “But we’re looking to medal for sure. That’s our goal this year. But where that ends up, we’ll see.”

The Lions have now won the provincial title 12 times in total, which is tied with Winnipeg Lucania for the third most in Manitoba soccer history.

The Winnipeg Scottish own the record as they claimed 14 provincial titles between 1914-1965. The Winnipeg United Weston are in second with 13 titles from 1909-1963.

taylor.allen@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @TaylorAllen31

Taylor Allen
Reporter

Taylor Allen is a sports reporter for the Winnipeg Free Press. Taylor was the Vince Leah intern in the Free Press newsroom twice while earning his joint communications degree/diploma at the University of Winnipeg and Red River College Polytechnic. He signed on full-time in 2019 and mainly covers the Blue Bombers, curling, and basketball. Read more about Taylor.

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