A night of firsts saw the Foothills Falcons zone in on an elusive playoff victory.
The Foothills Falcons edged the previously undefeated No. 4 ranked George McDougall Mustangs 13-10 in a defensive battle Saturday night at Shouldice Park to earn the Tier I South Central Zone championship and advance in the high school football provincial playoffs.
“I’ve noticed during the season we’ve had some problems with keeping in it,” said Falcons linebacker Jaysen Young. “And I was really impressed with how the team played, we stayed in it the whole time, nobody broke.
“I don’t think there was too much nerves from the defence, I brought everyone together on the sidelines and said, ‘We need to stay together if we want to win and keep playing.’”
The Mustangs opened the scoring with an interception almost leading to a pick-six with the Airdrie team settling for a short yardage field goal.
The Falcons jumped in front on a goalline touchdown run from quarterback Emerson Liepert followed by a tricky two-point conversion from the signal caller to Jamison Kloster.
George Mac took advantage of another turnover in the red-zone and punched it in through a quarterback sneak from Kohen Bohnet to take a 10-8 lead into halftime.
Falcons head coach Nathan St. Dennis said the turnover battle saw the team give the Mustangs most of what they did positively on offence through the first two quarters.
And turnabout was fair play in the second half.
“That’s what we saw, get pressure, force them to do things they don’t normally do, get the ball,” the coach added. “And it’s nice to see ourselves show up physically, they’re a physical team, they’re undefeated, a good football team and seeing that out of our guys is really great.”
The Falcons took an 11-10 lead in the third quarter on an 18-yard field goal from Jacob Van Horne and preserved the advantage with a series of clutch defensive efforts.
In the fourth quarter with the Mustangs moving the chains, defensive back Caleb Baker jumped the route in front of two receivers and picked off Bohnet at the 9-yard line.
“He’s such a great kid,” St. Dennis said. “He plays both ways for us, transitioned to that, he’s just a great athlete, grew up playing football in Okotoks and he just gets it.
“You put him in a spot and he wants it bad.”
The interception set up a huge run down the sidelines by receiver Lucas Gough which led to the Mustangs taking a safety to get out of bad field position.
The Falcons secondary once again came up clutch to close out the contest.
Defensive back Rylan Neish added another interception for the Comp at their own 42-yard line with just under two minutes on the clock.
“I just knew they were eventually going to pass it to (James Drake) because he’s a big target on the field,” Neish said. “I just dropped deep, I read the quarterback’s eyes and saw where he was looking and jumped in front of that thing to pick it and seal the deal.
“All we knew is we had to keep shutting them down and keep fighting hard in order to win this game. That pick from Baker really helped us because they were really close, that really turned it over and we really settled again.”
The playoff victory is the first at the high school level for every player on the No. 7 ranked Falcons.
“It rises our confidence so much,” Neish said. “We know we can play with the best teams in the province. This was the number four team in the province and we showed them that we are here and we’re here to win this thing.
“It means a lot to me to finally win a playoff game, it’s my senior year, I’m looking forward to the next game and hopefully we can bring it home.”
St. Dennis said the playoff triumph is especially rewarding for the Falcons seniors who were part of the program starting fresh in 2021 on the heels of a full season on the shelf due to the pandemic.
“We had a lot of good film on them and knew what to expect and I feel like we’re in a great groove,” St. Dennis said. “The kids have that routine of practice and part of is the attitude towards it, the effort towards it and it’s just kind of a machine right now.
“It’s exactly what we want.”
On deck is another regional clash, with the Falcons and No. 8 ranked All Saints Legends out of Legacy set to lock horns in the provincial quarterfinals on Nov. 11 in Calgary. Kick-off is 12 p.m. back at Shouldice Park.
