The kick-off to last Friday's Humboldt Collegiate Institute (HCI) Mohawks nine-man football game saw two powerhouse programs set to swap paint in Clavet.
The Clavet Cougars won three provincial championships in a row from 2007-2009 and earned a silver medal last year.
The HCI Mohawks are five-time champions with the most recent wins coming in 2008 and 2010. They also came hair-trigger close to qualifying for the final in 2009.
"We have a lot of respect for them and their program," offered HCI head coach, Shaun Gardiner. "Today just reinforced that."
Indeed, Clavet held a 20 -13 lead heading into the fourth quarter. Both teams erupted to score a combined 35 points in the final frame.
"It was a shootout there, near the end we would score, and I would think, 'Okay, now we are out of danger,' but they just would not go away," said HCI's assistant coach Tom Schwinghamer.
The scoring opened after a mishandled ball by a Cougar punt returner was recovered by Mohawk Gar Hobbs. HCI's Daegan Engele and his beefy offensive line mucked the ball in two plays later.
The Mohawk kicking game also caused some excitement after a Cougar turnover on downs. HCI's Josh Giddings felt some heat as he was set to punt from inside his 10-yard line, so he took the ball up the middle for a 28-yard gain. However, the offence couldn't capitalize.
On the other side of the ball, Brian Hinz's defence had a different look with which to contend.
"They maybe ran the ball three or four times," the coach said. "The rest of the time, they passed out of a spread set that gave us some trouble. It was a real fast break offence."
Indeed, the Cougars went over the top three times for touchdowns.
The first long touchdown pass came in the first quarter while the other two came in the fourth.
"We were out of our comfort zone there a little bit. We ended up moving our defensive ends out to jam their slotbacks. When they got easy releases, they punished us," Hinz said.
Another noticeable difference in Clavet's game was that they didn't employ a placement or field goal team. All of their conversion attempts came from the offence, which was only good on two of five tries.
Despite the deep strikes given up, Hinz still had praise for his charges.
"(Grade 10) Brodie Brown was playing due to our injury situation, and he had two interceptions with one inside our 20-yard line and also broke up a pass in our end zone. Dylan Meyer had a pick and so did Jarvis Painter," Hinz noted.
The other Mohawk touchdown scored in the first half came from Jonathan Zimroz on a 44-yard run. Daegan Engele punched in another sneak from three yards out to open the second half scoring in the fourth quarter. Then Engele connected with Josh Giddings on a picturesque pass at the Mohawk 18-yard line that the fleet slotback took 82 yards to the house.
Giddings turned on the afterburners a second time three minutes later as he went in from 59 yards out. The Mohawk quarterback rounded out the scoring on a four-yard sneak, this time standing up, with just over a minute left.
The final score was 41-34 for HCI.
"These kinds of games are how our kids grow," declared Gardiner, "and believe me, we have some growing to do. We didn't block or tackle as well as we have been taught. As a result, we took a lot of penalties and gave up too many yards too easily. Our placement unit has to be more crisp. We can play better."
The Mohawks will have a chance to do so next Friday during their game at home versus the L.P. Miller Bears. Game time at Glen Hall Park is 4 p.m.
