The Bow Valley Wolverines snapped a two-game scoreless drought and managed arguably their finest performance of the season, but fell to the Medicine Hat Vikings 37-14 on Friday (Oct. 3) at Millennium Field.
In their only regular season home game in the Big Sky Conference, the Wolverines played a much tighter defensive game and their offence, led by Grade 10 quarterback Matt Mahler and wide receiver Zak Jantz, began to round into form.
Last week against Claresholm, coach Gord Elser asked his team for a gift in the form of points on the board. He had to wait an extra week, but he was rewarded with two touchdowns against Tier 3 Medicine Hat, one when the Wolverines capitalized on a Vikings fumble and snuck it into the end zone.
“We broke a huge scoreless jinx, in my mind. It gave us some momentum. I told the boys they looked like a football team today,” Elser said. “It’s all about field position. We’ll take those breaks and some came our way this week.”
Jantz had the play of the game for the Wolverines with an incredible 80-yard punt return in the fourth quarter. The touchdown came just moments after the Wolverines lost their biggest player, Matt Brown, to what appeared to be a season-ending knee injury.
After the run, Jantz pointed skyward, dedicating the touchdown to his teammate.
“Mahler impressed as quarterback. His play action is fantastic. For a Grade 10 coming in, he did a great job, and we’re grooming him for Grade 12. Zak ran really hard out there … He had a great catch and that run,” Elser said.
The Wolverines were definitely the smaller team, and only dressed 24 players against the Vikings army of 42. Playing up a division, they battled fiercely, and pressed the Vikings to fumble frequently.
Both Mahler and Jantz had more time to wreak havoc thanks to a much-improved offensive line, which Elser said was the real stars of the game.
“The last three games, we were getting over 100 yards in penalties because the offensive line couldn’t remember the snap count. We were really good today. We were only caught offside once,” Elser said. “The offensive line, compared to where they were, they did really well. They were better than everybody.”
The Wolverines have one more regular season game against Rundle College on Oct. 9 in Calgary, where they expect to only have 20 players. Their first playoff game has already been set as well. The Wolverines will play High River at 2 p.m. on Oct. 25 at Millennium Field.
Elser said the lopsided losses that have left the team with an 0-4 record will help in the long run, as the Wolverines have several smart players who are learning lessons in the loses.
“It’s going in the right direction,” Elser said.
