The St. Thomas University Tommies head into the ACAA Championships as the #3 seed and will face the UNBSJ Seawolves in their opening matchup on Saturday at 5:30pm.
The Seawolves won both matchups against the Tommies this year, both by a score of 3-2. Despite those outcomes Tommies head coach John-Ryan Morrison is optimistic about the third matchup between these two teams.
“UNBSJ has had a great season and I knew we would likely see them again if we were going to make it back to back trips to the ACAA final,” said Morrison. “We are quite a different team than when we faced them earlier.”
This season has come with it’s fair share of adversity for the Tommies, as they found themselves on the outside of the playoff picture looking in at the midpoint of the year. A place Morrison didn’t envision the team being in before the season started. Needing to close out the season strong, the Tommies did just that, closing out the season 4-1-2, getting points in their final three games of the year.
“Last week was tough, but we put ourselves in that situation, so it was up to us to get out of it,” said Morrison about his team’s final week of the season. “The added pressure of not being able to lose any of your last four games to qualify for playoffs will only serve us well going into playoffs. We’ve fixed our defensive issues and finished the season by only conceding 2 goals in the last 5 games and combine that with our solid attacking options, we are all very confident going into the weekend.”
The solid attacking options come in the form of a pair of rookies for the Tommies, Brett Springer and Adam Evelyn, who combined for 15 goals in the Tommies 12 games.
“We are very excited about this weekend and looking forward to not only bringing home a banner but helping cheer on our women’s team to do the same.”
The games can be seen on acaatv.ca.