Joey Payeur
Chad Canfield hopes eight days can make a world of difference.
The head coach of the Muskie football team must figure out a winning formula by Friday’s WHSFL Currie Division quarter-final against the Elmwood Giants in Winnipeg.
Whatever plan was in place didn’t work last Thursday, when the host Giants prevailed 31-0 in the two teams’ regular-season finale.
The game also turned out to be a playoff preview as the Muskies wound up finishing sixth with a 3-4 record while Elmwood took third at 5-2.
But Canfield is keeping a positive outlook in the face of what seems like a monstrous challenge.
“That’s the best I’ve ever felt about a 31-0 loss,” he stated firmly.
“Obviously, we got beat pretty handily . . . but I don’t think anyone got the opinion we can’t play with them,” he added.
That would be a fair statement—considering the Muskies only trailed 1-0 after the first quarter on a missed field goal attempt by Elmwood.
“We received the ball off the kick-off and got pinned deep, then we get a first down, then we fumble,” recalled Canfield.
“Our defence stops them, we get the ball back, and then we end up getting intercepted because the receiver didn’t come back to break up the play,” he added.
The Giants started rolling in the second quarter behind running back T.J. Prodon, scoring a pair of majors to lead 15-0 at halftime.
Another touchdown in the third made it 22-0 for the host team, which tacked on a fourth major and a field goal in the fourth quarter for the final margin of victory.
“We got sloppy in the second half again,” said Canfield.
“We can’t get down on ourselves when we get down by a couple of touchdowns,” he stressed.
The story of the game yet again for the Muskies was the fact there were more flags in the air than at the United Nations headquarters.
“We took over 100 yards of penalties again, including about a half-a-dozen major fouls,” Canfield fumed.
“I don’t know how to stop it at this point. . . . We’d have them stopped on second down and then one of our guys would push somebody after the play and get a penalty.
“We’re going to have to take a couple of the repeat offenders in practice and have them walking away in that situation,” he noted.
The Muskies ended up tied for sixth in the Currie Division with the Tec Voc Hornets (Winnipeg), with the two teams having not faced each other this season and having identical 2-3 records against similar divisional opponents.
That meant going to the next tie-breaker of points for and against, with Fort High coming out on top at minus-20 compared to the Hornets at minus-41.
The black-and-gold clinched a playoff spot when the Maples Marauders (1-5-1) tied the St. John’s Tigers back on Oct. 11 to leave them four points behind the Muskies with only one game to go.
Special teams also will be a focal point for Canfield in practice this week.
“They [Elmwood] tried a couple of fake punts and got us on both of them,” he noted.
“That’s a coaching mistake, for sure.
“Our punt coverage was OK, but we’re still not getting down the field quickly enough,” Canfield added.
“Elmwood didn’t get any pressure on our punter but they’re more of a return team, anyway.”
The Giants will be formidable again this Friday, but Canfield believes his team needs to do some serious soul-searching about its own performance before analyzing their opponent.
“We’ve got to look in the mirror and take care of our own business before worrying about them,” he reasoned.
“They run a similar offence to us, so there shouldn’t be any scheme problems they try and give us that we can’t figure out.”
Tristen Badiuk, the Muskies’ leading receiver, is expected to be out of action for Friday’s playoff tilt after injuring his ankle in last week’s game.
The other Currie Division quarter-finals, which all will take place tomorrow, will see the top-ranked West Kildonan Wolverines (7-0) from Winnipeg hosting the eighth-seeded College Lorette Collegiate Scorpion (2-5).
The No. 2-rated St. Norbert Celtics (6-1) will face seventh-seeded Tec Voc while the fourth-ranked Kenora Broncos (5-2) go head-to-head at home against the fifth-seeded Daniel McIntyre Maroons (4-3).
