Windsor’s Best Team No One Is Talking About

Ryan Blevins

 

The University of Windsor Men’s Soccer team has gone the duration of a nationally-ranked season without gaining much interest from many local sports fans and media.

The Lancers Soccer team finished their season Sunday with a 12-2-2 record in conference play, good enough for second place in their division. After this record setting season where the Lancers defeated the number one ranked York Lions, the Lancers found themselves in the Canadian Interuniversity Sport’s national top 10 rankings. This was the Lancers first time in the top 10 rankings since the final week of the 2013 season. Being ranked as high as third in the CIS national rankings the Lancers looked to gain fan support on a regular basis but were unsuccessful.

The Lancers received what university officials believe to be the largest crowd of the season in their first OUA playoff game Sunday when an estimated 1,000 fans cheered on the Men’s Soccer team.

Windsor Lancers second year center-midfielder Chris Al-Youssef said he believes the team deserved more recognition from fans

“You see teams like the Girls Basketball team. They get a lot of recognition, they obviously earned it…. that’s how it should be. You should earn it and I thought this year we definitely earned the right to get some recognition,” said Al-Youssef.

An estimated 1,800 fans of the University of Windsor’s Women’s Basketball team filled the St. Dennis Centre for their home opener Nov, 4. Tickets for the game were $10 and was free for students. A team with such national success was able to draw fans in, but on a nightly basis the third ranked Lancers soccer team played in front of a mostly empty stadium.

University of Windsor director of the division of athletics and recreational services Mike Havey said he hopes to expand the teams brand to garner more fan support in the future.

“With all the digital platforms and social media that is out there we’ve never had any more control over our own brand than we have right now. Before you would be nearly 100 per cent reliant in traditional media to cover your teams. Now with Facebook, web, Twitter, webcasting…. (we are) getting our brand out there,” said Havey.

In 2014 the OUA partnered with Stretch Internet to create OUA.tv, a free live streaming service that allows fans to watch basketball and football games from home. Regular season soccer games are not currently broadcast online. Even with this limited service it isn’t always easy for teams to gain coverage. Currently there is no charge for soccer games at the University of Windsor’s home stadium, Alumni Field.

University of Windsor director of soccer operations Steve Hart attributes the lack of attendance to being unacknowledged in certain media outlets.

“The Windsor Star sometimes leaves me disappointed. I wish they would cover more about soccer. We give information to them, it does not always hit the paper but it’s not uncommon for them to not put stuff in,” said Hart.

Nov 1 the Windsor Lancers Men’s Soccer team concluded their season with a 1-0 loss to the McMaster Marauders in the quarterfinals of the OUA playoffs ending their storied season without a championship.