The championships, awards and honours just keep piling up for Moose Jaw high school teams -- and these ones are a little more special than most.
The Saskatchewan High Schools Athletic Association recently announced that the Vanier Spirits girls soccer team and Central Cyclones boys soccer team had been awarded the Sask Milk Sportsmanship Awards for the 2021 high school 4A soccer season.
The honour goes to the school that best displayed the character and attributes associated with sportsmanship at their respective provincial championships. The honour comes with a special blue banner to hang in their gym, which for both schools will join a host of provincial title banners accumulated over the last few seasons
The high school soccer season ended up as another incredible one for Moose Jaw teams and especially for the Spirits. They headed into the campaign as the defending provincial champions from way back in 2019, and interestingly enough, their season followed much the same pattern as it did back then.
The Spirits ended up playing their best soccer of the season at the perfect time and wouldn’t allow a goal through the entirety of playdowns and provincials -- defeating Regina Luther in their provincial semifinal and downing the Central Cyclones 3-0 in the gold medal game.
The Central Cyclones went into their provincial playdown campaign with a sense of unfinished business after finishing second in the 4A boys provincials the previous two seasons.
They ended up winning 5-1 over Regina Luther and 2-0 over Regina Laval in regionals to advance to provincials and once there, the Cyclones left nothing to chance. A 4-0 win over Martensville in the semifinal sent Central to the gold medal game, and they’d finish off their gold medal run with a 3-1 victory over the Yorkton Sacred Heart Saints.
