Jackie Larocque
The HJ Cody Lakers high school football team trounced the Camrose Trojans 34-0 on Saturday to win the league championship.
The Lakers and the Trojans battled to see who would take home the league trophy. One team showed up to win, the other team showed up thinking they had already won.
The Lakers came on the field liked they owned it. Within the first 10 minutes of the game, Tyress Hamilton and Landon Rosene ping-ponged off the Trojans to get to the five-yard line.
Seth Blagen sauntered onto the field to kick a field goal putting the Lakers on the board with a 3-0 lead.
Matthew Bossert casually reached out to send the running back flying. Dylan Keller alligator-rolled a Trojan, causing him to spit out some grass and dirt.
Sulley Larocque took a hand-off straight up the middle (the right direction this time) for a first down. Landon Rosene and Kyle Eckenswiller leaped and caught Skylar Selk’s passes.
Camrose recovered a fumble, then Matthew Bossert recovered a fumble from Camrose, leading to Skylar passing to Chase Elwood for the first touchdown. With Seth’s foot, the score was 10-0.
Landon Gyori had perfect timing when a Trojan receiver caught the ball and he was right there to slam him into the ground. Rayden Thomas recovered yet another Trojan fumble and Skylar shot it to Kyle Eckenswiller for his first touchdown of the game. The successful convert brought the score to 17-0.
Rayden Thomas sandwiched Trojans with the help of Austin Ilcissin and Sulley Larocque. Liam Hoven was a brick wall as Trojan players literally bounced off him. And then again, Camrose fumbled a pass and Josh Rideout recovered it.
This enabled the Lakers to play very sneaky play. Skylar passed the ball to Landon Rosene who bolted towards the outside. As he passed Kyle Eckenswiller, he pitched the ball to him. Kyle snagged the ball and continued to the opposite side of Landon. While the Trojans were chasing Landon, Kyle was heading to the end zone with the ball. By the time the Trojans realized who had the ball, it was pretty much too late and Kyle raced for his second touchdown. With the convert, the score came to 24-0.
Jared Winder pummelled any Trojan with a ball coming his way. Sulley Larocque jumped on, flipped and caused several Camrose players to pick dirt from their teeth. Matthew Bossert was swinging and stopping any Trojan player from making any headway.
Skylar threw pass after pass. The receivers and running backs gained yard after yard. The offence line consisting of Braydon Mayer, Jarod Winder, Grayson Herder, Liam Hoven, Brandon Tweed, Josh Rideout and Austin Simpson worked as a well-oiled machine play after play preventing any Trojan from breaking their barrier.
Braydon Mayer, Austin Ilcissin, Trent Tarling, Liam Hoven, Austin Simpson and Jonny Payne made up the defensive line acting like a wall of snow, blocking The Trojans and pushing them back as they turned into an avalanche crushing the offensive line of Camrose. This allowed Austin Ilcissin to sack the Trojans’ quarterback.
Skylar passed to Kyle Eckenswiller, who made it to the second-yard line. Another pass to Kyle resulted in his third touchdown of the game, bringing the score to 31-0 with the conversion added in.
Cory Prediger and CJ Wilson snagged a couple passes from Skylar, as did Calvin Burton. But try as Camrose did, they were unable to get past the Lakers’ defence and just to make a point, the Lakers kicked in another field goal ending the game with a 34-0 shut out to become the league champions.
It was an honour to watch these young men play. Both the defence and offence played like a well-versed team. Plays were mixed up and performed with a high style of excellence. They supported each other and it paid off as they came away with the 2014 league championship.
Hats off to the coaching staff — Jeremy Braitenback, Rick Dunnigan, Jas Payne and Mike Williams — who volunteer to coach these young men and put up with their antics. Trainers Jessie Stormoen, Regan Eisler and Kaylee Campbell fixed up any injuries to keep them on the field.
Saturday (Nov. 8) will see the Lakers take on Cold Lake for the first provincial game in Sylvan Lake. The game kicks off at 1:30 p.m.