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MONTREAL – Julien Priol, a freshman midfielder from France, tallied a first-half hat-trick as visiting Laval spooked a bewitched McGill men’s soccer team with a stunning 3-1 semifinal playoff upset on a Halloween Friday night at Molson Stadium.

It was indeed a shocker for the second-place Redmen, who appeared to show up in the wrong costumes for the first half and trailed 3-0 before halftime. Laval, which finished third with a 6-3-3 record, will advance to the CIS national championships, hosted by Carleton University next weekend.

The division-leading Montreal Carabins will host Laval in the Quebec championship game on Sunday, but both finalists will be going to Nationals. The Carabins sunk Sherbrooke 4-1 in the other Quebec semifinal, Friday.

Priol scored in the 10th, 20th and 44th minutes to hand McGill just their second loss at home this season, where they had compiled a 6-1-1 record overall, heading into the sudden-death affair.

In his final game for the Redmen, midfielder James Scholefield, a fifth-year senior from Senneville, Que., ruined sophomore Jerome Morneau’s bid for a shutout with seven minutes to play.

REDMEN RAP: McGill ended up with an 11-3-5 record overall, including a 7-1-4 mark in league play…The loss put a sudden end to McGill’s most successful campaign in six years, since finishing second in the 2002 season with an identical  7-1-4 record… Aside from Scholefield, other expected losses to graduation include goaltender Olivier Boulva, defender Omar John, midfielder Shawn Amarasekera and forward Gareth Pugh.