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United wins in OT, advances in provincial cup play

Nanaimo beats Lakehill 2-1, next up is a matchup against Cowichan

It took a little longer than anticipated, but Nanaimo United was able to win and advance to the provincial cup quarterfinals.

United’s Div. 1 men’s soccer team defeated Lakehill FC by a 2-1 score Saturday at Merle Logan Field in a match that required overtime.

Daragh Fitzgerald scored his second goal of the game in the first half of OT and United held on despite some tense moments right at the end of overtime.

“I thought we played really well,” Fitzgerald said. “The Nanaimo United way is those grinding wins, really, really, hard-fought wins; that’s exactly what that was.”

Nanaimo coach Lucian Serban said he aged “at least a year” during the match as his team missed out on capitalizing on some in-close chances. He said United tweaked the game plan to try to create offence as the game wore on and got some good luck at last.

“We switched to a more attacking [formation]. More risky, but I thought we had to risk to take the result we needed,” Serban said.

Lakehill forced a flurry of action around the Nanaimo goal in the final minutes of the second half of OT and Geoff Hackett, VISL Div. 1 Keeper of the Year, needed to make a heroic game-saving stop, leaping to re-direct a shot up and over the crossbar.

The result sets up an intriguing quarterfinal matchup, as Nanaimo will get a match against Cowichan FC in Duncan. The two teams met in Jackson Cup playdowns and Cowichan won in a controversial fashion.

“There was a couple of things in the cup game that didn’t go our way, so we’re delighted that we’ll get a chance to go down and try to put it right,” Fitzgerald said.

Serban said a rematch with Cowichan is exactly what Nanaimo wanted.

“We’re going to give them a good game…” the coach said. “We’ll try to have a good game and enjoy it and [may] the best team win, but we want to be that team.”

Scheduling details haven’t yet been confirmed.



sports@nanaimobulletin.com

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