The York Lions men's soccer team played their last game of the 2018 season on Saturday in the consolation finals of the U SPORTS national championships against the UQAM Citadins and fell by a score of 1-0.
 
On a gorgeous fall day on the University of British Columbia campus, the Lions played the possession game early on as the game started slowly with neither side registering a shot in the first 12 minutes. Lions goaltender Shyon Gaeeni easily made the first save of the match in the 13^th minute off of a strike from the Citadins' Oussama Kounna from the right corner of the box.
 
A few minutes later, Lions defenceman Daniel Gogarty made a daring play to cut off streaking UQAM forward Malick N'Diaye which resulted in a big collision which left both players down on the field. Both players were able to bounce back though, as N'Diaye proved to be one of the Citadins most dangerous players throughout the game, while Gogarty, playing in his last game in a Lions uniform after five years with the squad, was his usual steady self in anchoring the Lions defence.
 
The Lions began to pick up the pace at the mid-way point of the first-half, which resulted in midfielder Eddie Lay finding some open room near the Citadins goal and blasting a shot that goalkeeper Simon Beauregard-Barrette did well to keep out of the net.
 
N'Diaye opened the scoring for the Citadins in the 39^th minute after Gaeeni made the first save on a header near the keeper's right post, but the rebound found N'Diaye's foot and he buried it into the top of the net to give the RSEQ finalists a 1-0 lead. N'Diaye had a glorious chance to make the score 2-0 just a few minutes later when he picked up a Lions turnover and broke in alone, but Gaeeni came out to challenge and made a nice stop to keep the deficit at one goal. The game remained scoreless for the rest of the half as UQAM took a 1-0 lead into the locker room.
 
The Lions again were in control of the ball in the early stages of the second-half, but had trouble finding openings in the Citadins defence. In the 64^th minute midfielder Steve Kloutsouniotis found some open field down the right side and sent a dangerous looking crossing pass toward the goal but it sailed high over the net.
 
Gaeeni made a nice stop in the 73^rd minute, as a N'Diaye again had a good scoring chance for the Citadins. The keeper got a piece of the forward's low shot and had to reach behind him to prevent the ball from trickling past the goal line.
 
As the final minutes ticked away the Lions were in desperation mode to try and tie the game and were buzzing around the Citadins net with a number of good scoring chances. Kloutsouniotis was all over the field for the Lions at this point, and sent a beautiful crossing pass towards the net that Jorgo Nika headed expertly at the UQAM goal but the ball floated just over the crossbar. Then in the final seconds, Kloutsouniotis got behind Beauregard-Barrette and had an open net to shoot at but hammered a high bouncing ball just over the crossbar as the crowd at Thunderbird Stadium looked on in disbelief at the tremendous action in the final minutes. Just seconds later the whistle blew to end the game in a 1-0 victory for the Citadins.
 
Lions midfielder Emmanuel Zambazis picked up his second player of the game award of the tournament while UQAM midfielder Hamza Methamem was named player of the game for the Citadins.
 
With the loss the Lions finish the season in sixth-place overall in the country after going 1-2 at the U SPORTS championships. Overall the Lions went 16-2-3 on the season and brought home the seventh OUA championship in the history of the program.