Foothills Falcons coach Darren Olson might want to remind his squad about the last provincial elections in B.C. and Alberta as they prepare for their first-place showdown with the Rundle College Cobras this week.
Both elections showed it doesn’t matter what the polls say, on the day of decision anybody can win.
The Falcons jumped to No. 1 in the Tier II (750 to 1,249 students) rankings after beating the Canmore 64-25 last week in Canmore.
The Falcons improved to 7-0 with the victory.
“I guess it’s nice to get recognition but really it means nothing,” Olson said. “As far as we are concerned we are 0-0 and Rundle is our first game. All the stuff we have done before has no bearing on the outcome on Thursday night.”
The game is a rematch of last year’s Big Rock Conference final and will decide the regular season title. The Cobras stunned the Falcons last year 49-30.
Olson will be heading back to his college days when he takes on the Cobras. Olson and Rundle College coach Brent Hargreaves played for the University of Calgary Dinos and the Cobras use a similar offence used by hall-of-fame Dinos coach Peter Connellan.
“They use a lot more traditional offence than what we have seen with a fullback and a running back,” Olson said. “Their running back (Noah Muruve) beat Foothills up pretty bad last year and we definitely need to take care of that… Brent is an old Dinos quarterback and he has brought a lot of Peter Connellan stuff with him…. They will try to control the tempo of the game with their running game.”
The Cobras’ offence is like taxes. Sure you know it’s coming, you just prepare as much as possible so it doesn’t hurt too much.
“It all comes down to execution, whatever team does a better job of execution,” Olson said. “Coaching wise, we have been exposed to this system, but player wise, they haven’t seen it with all these spread offences these days.”
Hargreaves has seen the rankings, and he said he’s looking forward to his squad playing the No. 1 team in Tier II. The Cobras are ranked No. 3 in Tier III.
“Anytime you get a chance to play a ranked team in a tier above you, well our players notice that,” Hargreaves said. “They want to show they can play with them. We also know Foothills is a great team with a lot of team speed with a lot of talent. We love the opportunity to take it to them.”
He admitted the Cobras will be spending plenty of time on the ground against the Falcons and it is stuff any Dino alumni will recognize.
“A lot of the stuff we use I used at U of C and there is Connellan stuff in there,” he said. “Anytime we can run the football successfully we will do it. We have a very talented running back in Muruve.
“But I think we have shown against some other teams that we can pass the ball if we have too.”
He said the Falcons offer a lot of challenges for his squad, adding Foothills quarterback Hunter Karl not only runs the ball well, but as an arsenal of receivers to throw too in Rory Forrester, Garrett Young, T.J. Tighe and others.
He said the Falcons’ defence is likely the fastest the Cobras have seen all year.
Falcons outside linebacker Ben Wattie saw Foothills’ No. 1 ranking on the weekend and he’s confident it won’t go to his team’s collective head.
Especially the guys on the team who played in the loss to Rundle where Muruve was Jon Cornish like in rushing for more than 200 yards.
“I still think about that loss, especially since it was our last home game,” Wattie said. “They surprised us it was a pretty big shock.”
Foothills has to treat Muruve like the Cobra running back was an extra in Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds”.
Stop him with a swarm of Falcons.
“He is a strong running back and really strong,” Wattie said.
“If we wrap up, hit him low and keep our feet moving, I think we can stop him. We have been really good about gang-tackling this year. If one Falcon stops a guy, eight others are on him right away.”
As for the No. 1 ranking, that is yesterday’s news, according to Wattie.
The kick-off is at 5 p.m. at Rundle College, located on 17 Avenue S.W. and approximately 73 Street.
To see the rankings go to www.footballalberta.ab.ca
