VICTORIA - The UVic Vikes men's field hockey team resume the second half of their Vancouver Premier League play this weekend, Jan. 28, hosting the Surrey Lions at 2:00 p.m on UVic's artificial field hockey pitch.
ROSTER /
FULL SCHEDULE
The Vikes are currently 1-4-2 in league play and anchor the Premier A division standings, however, head coach #Michael Lee# is confident in his team.
"We stand a very good chance against the Lions. We beat them in our first game of the year and held most of the play in that game," said Lee.
The Surrey Lions are in fourth place in the league with a 3-3-2 record and have a contingency of experienced players. The Vikes have relied heavily on the experience of lone senior
Derrick Norton (Victoria, BC), as well as David Bell (Victoria, BC) and
Gavin Titley (Vancouver, BC). In addition, youth has also provided a lot of the consistency and strength for the Vikes.
"The last few years we have had some older, more experience player that we could lean on but this season it has been nice seeing the Junior National team players grow into their new roles with the Vikes team," said Lee of Team Canada's
Samuel Jones (Vancouver, BC),
James Kirkpatrick (Victoria, BC),
Brenden Bissett (Vancouver, B.C.) and
Matthew Sarmento (Vancouver, BC). "Now that the senior players have moved on, the Junior National team players are being given a new challenge of leading the group."
Sarmento has been the consistent lead goal scorer all season for the Vikes. Kirkpatrick has been key in the back field for the Vikes while Jones and Bissett have lead the charge in the midfield.
The Vikes have also had tremendous success this season from goalkeeper
Davis Robertson (Vancouver, B.C.), a rookie from Vancouver, B.C. In early January, the Vikes competed in an indoor field hockey tournament hosted at the Richmond Oval in Richmond, B.C. Robertson was instrumental in the team's performance, being called upon to make game changing saves consistently.
The Vikes will host games the next three weekends of games at 2:00 p.m. at UVic's artificial turf field. The Vikes host the Lions this weekend, the Victoria Selects on Feb. 4 and United Brothers on Feb. 11.
