It's shaping up to be a year filled with promise for the St. Albert High Skyhawks.
"This may be, as a whole, the best bunch of athletes we've had in a long, long time. They are only going to get better and that's what excites me so much," said Sam Johnson, head coach of the high school football team. "I'm very encouraged, absolutely, but we've still got a ways to go. It's a project, right? We want to be peaking at the end of October."
The last game for the Skyhawks before they kick off the metro Edmonton league season was Thursday's 12-6 exhibition win against the Ross Sheppard Thunderbirds at Riel Park field.
"I saw some good things but we can still play better," Johnson said.
The Skyhawks didn't look like the same team that went down to defeat 21-7 to Parkland last week in St. Albert.
"It was night and day and today was great. It's a great momentum shifter," said co-captain Tanner Doll. "The difference was our intensity in practice. We had a terrible week of practice for that game. This week we sharpened up and it showed today."
In the second quarter, Grade 12 running back Spencer Duff turned a short pass completion into a 45-yard touchdown with some great moves that befuddled a pair of defenders. The converted TD, plus a safety the T-birds conceded after a gung-ho defensive stand by the Skyhawks, made it 9-0 at halftime.
A field goal by Matteo Sistito from about the 20-yard line in the fourth quarter rounded out the scoring. Leading up to the successful kick was a questionable pass interference call against the T-birds.
"We showed we can throw the ball," Johnson said. "However we've got to be able to move the ball better and score some points. We left, in my opinion, 16 or maybe 22 points on the field today and we've got to be able to finish those off if we're going to reach our ultimate goal.
"We're missing some steps on offence but that's why you have exhibition games, so you can get ready for the regular season."
Johnson was happy with the effort at the line of scrimmage, when the game was too close to call down the stretch.
"Offensive line came through at the end when we needed them to open some holes and burn the clock a little bit," he said.
Defensive dynamos
In the first half the T-birds were held to negative yards on offence.
"Defence was stellar today and did a heck of a job," Johnson said. "[Defensive back] Emery Mindana and guys like that stepped up and played very hard."
The T-birds got on the board by returning the second-half kick off to the end zone. They went for two points on the conversion but the pass play was snuffed out.
On their first offensive possession of the half, the T-birds marched the ball into Skyhawks' territory but fumbled it away in the backfield. Doll recovered it at the 19.
Before quarter time, on third down and 10 at the Skyhawks' 14, a pass into the end zone by the T-birds fell incomplete with the receiver in tight coverage.
With 2:30 left to play, the T-birds were stopped on third down at the Skyhawks' 16 by a swarm of tacklers.
On what turned out to be the T-birds last crack at a touchdown, they huddled up at the Skyhawks' 52 with 1:25 remaining. After a successful third down conversion, the T-birds threw two incomplete passes while under heavy pressure. On third down, the T-birds were flagged for illegal procedure, which pushed them back to their 54. On the next play, they completed a pass but Andre Leduc wrapped up the receiver shy of the first down at the Skyhawks' 50 with 21 seconds on the clock.
"It was a pretty good battle," said Doll, a hellacious Grade 12 middle linebacker. "Team-wise, it was a step in the right direction."
Deep in talent
The 17-year-old tackling machine pointed to the Skyhawks' depth as their biggest strength this year.
"We've got lots of it. We can cycle players in and we're still comfortable with everyone that is in," Doll said. "We've got good Grade 10s coming in. There are three of them, I believe. One is hurt right now; he is one of our better receivers, Brendan Thera, but then we've got [Josh] Wilkie and Duff, who is going to have a breakout year, and Danton [Vanderheide], who had a huge game last game. Mike [Spagnolo] is controlling the offence at quarterback so it's really looking great."
League play in the Carr conference starts this Thursday for the Skyhawks against the Austin O'Brien Crusaders. Game time is 5 p.m. in St. Albert. Last year the Skyhawks placed third out of four teams in the conference. In the semifinals they lost a heartbreaking 21-14 overtime decision to the Crusaders en route to a 1-3 metro league record.
"I'm very excited to get going. It will be a good year," said Doll, the Skyhawks' co-rookie of the year in 2009.
The hype has already started for the Oct. 7 game of the year against the Bellerose Bulldogs, who moved up to Carr from the Miles conference with the Archbishop Jordan Scots. The Skyhawks, made up of players from the St. Albert Catholic and Paul Kane high schools, have never lost a game to Bellerose in senior or junior since the inaugural Showdown in St. Albert kicked off in 1999.
"It's just one game in the whole season. You can't just sum up your season against Bellerose so you've got to prepare for that game that week. We can't be looking forward and just focusing on Bellerose. We have to take it one game at a time," said Doll, who was joined by Spagnolo on the U18 provincial team that finished last at the Football Canada Cup in July in Wolfville, N.S.
