The Dalmeny Cougars high school football team put up a valiant effort against the Shellbrook Aardvarks but just came up short, dropping a 52-42 decision at home on October 7.
Dalmeny found itself in a hole early in the first quarter, after Shellbrook scored a touchdown on a long rushing play during the first offensive series of the game.
However, the Cougars had a quick answer to that touchdown by finding the end zone during their first drive of the contest. Quarterback Owen Huber found an open Sawyer Brown for long catch-and-run play.
But again, Shellbrook took advantage of some Dalmeny missed-tackles, and the Aardvarks scored another rushing touchdown on their second offensive possession of the game.
The Cougars’ defense needed to make some adjustments so the game wouldn’t get away from them and they did that as Shellbrook only led 14-6 after one quarter.
“They were a little tentative to start (the game) and then got their confidence going a little bit with the stop late in the first quarter; then they seemed to be willing and wanting to step up after that,” said Dalmeny head coach Cory Lewis.
Early in the second quarter after Shellbrook found the end zone, the Cougars stayed resilient and responded on their next offensive possession when Huber connected with first year player Noah Perrin for a touchdown.
“We actually, had a couple of Grade 9s score touchdowns so to see that, it was great,” said Lewis.
The Aardvarks ended up scoring two consecutive touchdowns and led 38-14 after the first half.
In the third quarter, after the Dalmeny defence forced a turnover on downs near midfield, the offence continued that momentum, and Harcus Peterson found the end zone to cut into the deficit.
Peterson had a productive game overall, helping his team sustain some offensive drives.
“He was playing smart. The position he plays, he has to read the defence and sort of find where to sit in the defence and he was doing that well,” said Lewis.
It was a wild finish to the game as both teams were trading touchdowns in the final quarter.
With only 41 seconds left in the matchup and trailing by two converted touchdowns, it would’ve been easy for Dalmeny to just run out the clock, but the Cougars continued to play hard and were aided by a couple Shellbrook penalties which led to a touchdown.
Throughout the contest, the Cougars offence had a nice mix of running and passing plays and Lewis said the key to success is to have a strong running game which sets up the passes.
Overall, Dalmeny played well against the Aardvarks, who only had one loss coming in to the game, and if the Cougars would have made more of PATs the outcome could have been different.
“We’ve got to work on our extra points, we missed too many of those. Being that it’s two points for the kick, it’s a big deal,” said Lewis.
The Cougars wrap up the regular season in another contest against the Aardvarks in Shellbrook on October 14.
