October 9th, 2001.

St Catherine Standard: Wolves to Playoff for Spot in Semifinals
by Winnipeg Fury

Wolves to playoff for spot in semifinals

St. Catharines hosting league championship

Jim Wallace
The Standard

Montreal Dynamite's win Monday night was bad news for St. Catharines Club Roma Wolves.

Montreal clinched fourth place in the Canadian Professional Soccer League standings with a 2-1 win over Toronto Supra, leaving the Wolves in fifth place and facing an uphill battle in this weekend's Rogers Cup playoffs to decide the league champions.

Montreal, who needed three weekend wins to overtake St. Catharines for the fourth playoff spot, will face the Wolves Friday night at Club Roma.

As host for the league championship, the Wolves earned the right to challenge the fourth-place finishers in a wild-card game. The winner will go on to Saturday's semifinal match.

"We have to dig very deep," Wolves general manager Armand DiFruscio said Monday night. "We have to face two strong teams.

"If we win, we will play Ottawa and they're the league powerhouse."

The first-year Wizards clinched first place Sunday by blanking Toronto Olympians 1-0 to finish with a 16-3-3 record and 51 points. The Olympians were second at 15-6-1 and 46 points.

The Wizards also captured the OZ Optics Cup two weeks ago.

"We have an opportunity to win something," DiFruscio said. "We were denied the cup, now hopefully not the playoffs."

The Wolves and Dynamite will kick off at 8:15 p.m., with the winner going home. Saturday's semifinal games are scheduled for 1 and 3 p.m. The Olympians and Supra meet in the other semifinal.

The consolation final is slated for Sunday at noon, with the championship game at 2 p.m.

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