Week 8 Roundup: Excalibur Use Dominant Second Half to Capture First in East

The Trent Excalibur did something as Week 8 of the CUFLA regular season wrapper up Sunday afternoon that no team has managed to do in eight years: knock the McGill Redmen off their perch atop the CUFLA East regular season standings. 

Trent entered Sunday's home game against the Redmen needing to win by at least two goals (possibly more, depending on the total goals scored in the game) to unseat McGill as regular season East Division champions for the first time the Bishop's Gaiters edged the Carleton Ravens on a tiebreaker to finish first back in 2010.

Since then, McGill has locked up the top seed in the East--albeit a couple of times on tiebreakers--every year. But the Excalibur entered Sunday's game with a game plan and confidence that they could execute it and win the division.

McGill still had control of its own destiny through the first half, as the Redmen trailed 4-3 through 20 minutes and 5-4 through 40 minutes. 

As McGill head coach Tim Murdoch said after the game, he knew that Trent has been a second half team all season, so his club needed to come out and play its best lacrosse in the final 40 minutes. They did not, while Trent just got better and better as the game went on to win by a final score of 12-7. 

Jeff Fernandes led the Trent attack with 4 goals and an assist but the key to the Excalibur's success was a balanced attack that made it dangerous for McGill to let anyone in the offensive zone find some open space. Midfielders Nick Chaykowsky and Nick Finlay each added 2 goals and an assist while four other players chipped in single goals. Seth Obadia was the top McGill scorer with 4 goals. 

In the other game played on Sunday, Queen's earned home field in the first round of playoffs when they downed Nipissing 14-11 to take third place. Had the Lakers won the game, they would have knocked Queen's down to fourth and next week's playoff game would have been held at Nipissing. 

Tyler Goodchild exploded for 6 goals to lead Queen's while Luca Danetta scored 5 and Kyle Aylesworth 4 for Nipissing.

The West Division standings were largely settled heading into the weekend. Western and Brock each won their final games to finish atop the division at 9-1 (the same record as Trent and McGill achieved). Western claimed first place by a tiny margin in the goal average formula tiebreaker between the two teams, each of whom beat the other by a single goal in the regular season series. 

Results and coverage from Week 8

Wednesday Oct 24
Brock 11, McMaster 5
Box score
Brock Athletics game story

Friday Oct 26
Western 19, Laurier 2
Box score

Toronto 9, McMaster 7
Box score

Saturday Oct 27
Brock 14, Guelph 7
Box score
Brock Athletics game story
Kurtis Woodland named Brock male athlete of the week

Bishop's 19, Carleton 5
Box score
Bishop's Athletics game story
Joel Wright named Bishop's male athlete of the week

McGill 9, Queen's 1
Box score
McGill Athletics game story

Nipissing 11, Ottawa 10
Box score
CUFLA.ca game story

Trent 12, McGill 7
Box score
Peterborough Examiner story
McGill Athletics game story

Queen's 14, Nipissing 11
Box score