The senior girls soccer teams from both North Island Secondary School and Port Hardy Secondary School have qualified to compete in the Provincial A Championship Tournament June 2-4 at Glenlyon Norfolk School in Victoria.
The NISS girls placed second in last week’s Island A Championships in Duncan and the PHSS girls finished third, with the top four teams advancing to the provincial finals.
NISS opened with an 11-0 romp over Gold River to earn its spot into the final four. The Norsemen then blanked Lake Cowichan 4-0 to reach the championship final.
In a rematch of last year’s provincial championship game, defending champion Glenlyon Norfolk shut down NISS 5-0 to take the title.
“We’ve got very few senior players, because grad will be held the same weekend — again (as the provincial tournament),” NISS coach Kathy Mitchell said. “It’s a young team, a rebuilding team, but the girls have a lot of talent and they’ll be a force in the coming seasons.”
The PHSS girls, who last traveled to provincials in 2009, also won big in their opening game of the Island tourney, defeating Duncan Christian School to reach the semifinals. After a loss to Glenlyon Norfolk in the semis, the Whalers topped Lake Cowichan to claim third place.
“We were told we were extremely sportsmanlike by the referees there,” PHSS coach Sam McMunnigle said. “They were quite impressed by the girls. We’ve got quite a few players who have been at it since Grade 8, so they’ve been working quite hard for this.”
The provincial championships will feature 16 teams, with games beginning at 9 a.m. each day. Each school will play three pool games Thursday and Friday, followed by a crossover semifinal Friday and a final placing game Saturday.
The tourney will use three fields at the University of Victoria soccer complex as well as the school field at Glenlyon Norfolk.
Players from all the schools will be feted with a banquet Friday evening, June 3.
