By Dan Plouffe
It wasn’t the golden finish they would have preferred, but fifth-best in the province was nothing to shake their sticks at for the local representatives, as the nation’s capital hosted the OFSAA girls’ field hockey championships for the first time since 1986 from Nov. 1-3 in Barrhaven and Nepean.
“It’s really a once in a lifetime kind of thing for these kids,” says John McCrae Bulldogs coach Sandeep Chopra, whose team got to play two games at their school’s field. “It’s an incredible experience for them to be able to play in front of their own home crowd. It may not happen again for another generation.”
The hometown teams didn’t get any luck from the OFSAA drawmakers, however, as Merivale and John McCrae were paired in the same pools as the first- and second-seeded schools from Waterloo – Resurrection and Sir John A. MacDonald, who went on to battle in the tournament final, which Resurrection won 1-0 to capture its third consecutive title.
The unseeded Merivale Marauders knocked off Burlington’s Notre Dame 1-0 at Mother Teresa to open their tournament, fell to Resurrection 4-0 at St. Joseph, and then upset Newmarket 1-0 at Longfields-Davidson Heights to earn their quarter-final encounter with Sir John A., a match that finished 2-0 in favour of the visitors.
“They had an outstanding year, and it was fun,” says Merivale coach Bill Osborne, who left much of the leadership to the team’s veterans this season. “And you know what? They really came together as a team to earn this opportunity.”
The Bulldogs, meanwhile, clawed their way to 2-1 and 1-0 victories over Caledon’s Robert F. Hall and Hamilton’s Westmount to assure their place in the playoff round, although they weren’t quite the same team playing on slippery, slow, bumpy grass surfaces as the slick group that dominated the national capital league on astro turf.
And then they really weren’t the same team come the second day of the competition when they lost a significant portion of their usual starting lineup in favour of a season-opening ringette tournament in Oshawa, which lead to 2-0 and 5-0 losses to John A. and Resurrection.
Indelible home field memory
The moment Chopra would like the players to keep with them is the way they persevered against their plucky Westmount competitors.
“I told them at the end of the game that for some of them, this might be the last time they play field hockey,” recounts the experienced Nepean Nighthawks club coach. “Some of them will go on to do great things, I’m sure. They’ll be doctors and lawyers, but this might be the last game of field hockey they ever play. I sure hope they had a lot of fun.”
John McCrae carried a decided advantage in play during the Westmount game, but could not score the crucial goal they required despite numerous short corners.
At last, Katherine Kohler-Grasseau – an Ottawa South United soccer player in the province’s top league who was a steadying, determined force for the Bulldogs – created the opportunity that Julie Nguyen banged home in the final minutes.
“I was just screaming,” recalls Nguyen, a senior who enjoyed seeing the sidelines lined with fellow students, parents and the Bulldog mascot despite the ugly, rainy weather. “We had great fans. A lot of them came out to support us. I loved it.”
Chopra – who, like Osborne at Merivale, stepped up to coach the team in place of their regular teacher-coach due to the teachers’ labour action – was very impressed with his group’s efforts overall this season, having won every game leading up to their last two matches.
“I’m really happy for (the seniors) to go out like this,” he explains. “They showed a lot of pride in the game and a lot of pride in their school.”