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ODSS Bears junior boys claim District 10 championship

October 30, 2018   ·   0 Comments

By Brian Lockhart

The Orangeville District Secondary Schools Bears junior boys soccer team won the District 10 championship on Thursday, October 18, in an epic final game against Centennial Collegiate Vocational Institute from Guelph.

The Bears have had a undefeated season and went to the final after winning their semi-final 3-2 over Guelph Collegiate on October 16.

As top seed the Bears hosted the championship game on the field at ODSS with a 3:30 p.m. start.

The Bears opened the scoring early in the first half on a goal from Andrew Paolucci.

Both teams were playing aggressively trying to get the edge in the game that was played in cool, windy conditions.

Tyler Graham got the second Orangeville goal early the second half.

With a lot of good defensive posturing, the Bears managed to keep the Centennial team from getting many scoring opportunities.

The third goal of the game came from a wild well placed head ball from Kyle Hooker from right in front of the Centennial net.

After the game, the referee stated it was “the best goal I’ve seen all year.”

Hooker got his second goal of the game with only a couple of seconds remaining when he made good on a penalty shot to give the Bears a 4-0 win.

“I think everybody played well, it was an amazing turn-out for the whole team. I think we played great,” said Bears striker Andrew Paolucci after the game. “We didn’t crack under pressure going into the game.”

Forward, Kyle Hooker, said he thought the team performed well as a unit once they got on the field.

“We played really well. There was a lot of movement and we played well as a team. We stopped them from getting through and went straight to the ball. We only gave them two or three shots (on goal).

Coach Giovanni Silveri said he was proud of what the team has accomplished and how they followed his coaching lead on the field.

“When we first played them (Centennial) in regular season we were down 2-0. We came back and scored in the last minute to beat them 4-3. I knew today was going to be a tough game. I changed the line-up to play a little more defensive. We wanted to lock this game right up. Defensively if you can lock a team up and win 1-0, that’s perfect. We happened to win 4-0. This team is very committed. I held practices every night and most of the boys showed up for almost every practice – even last night when we had pelting snow. They are very dedicated.”

The Bears had an outstanding season going 5-0 in before heading into the playoffs.

They averaged almost four goals per game while allowing only 11 against in five games.

Winning District 10 means the junior team will now go on to compete at the regional level at the Central Western Ontario Secondary Schools Association (CWOSSA) championship.

The CWOSSA championship games will take place on Thursday, October 25, and Friday, October 26, in Waterloo.

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