Jamie Mountain
You couldn’t have scripted a better second half for the Muskie football team in their “home game” last Thursday in Winnipeg.
After overcoming some early shakiness and sloppy plays, the Muskies stretched a slim 19-18 halftime lead into a convincing 50-25 win over the Neelin Spartans in Winnipeg High School Football League action.
The win improved the black-and-gold to 1-1 in the six-team Currie Division (‘A’) and they’ll be looking to keep that momentum going as they next host the Churchill Bulldogs (0-1) in their home-opener on Friday at 3 p.m. at Fort High.
“They’re not off to a great start this year, so hopefully we can make it worse for ’em on Friday,” Muskie co-coach Vic Davis said of the Bulldogs on Sunday.
“As long as we can just build off what we did against Neelin, we’ll be OK, but the kids gotta keep coming out to practice and if we get a good week of practice, I’m confident we can keep going like this.
“The kids know what they gotta do,” he reasoned.
“It’ll be really nice to not have to travel. I mean, that is an advantage because both of the away games . . . You know, you get on the bus, you got about 90 minutes [to get ready] and then all of sudden you’re playing football.
“So it’ll be nice moving around and not being cramped on a bus ride,” Davis added.
As for last Thursday’s win against the Spartans (0-2), which was the WHSFL’s “Game of the Week,” the Muskies were listed as the home team but it actually was played at a neutral field in Winnipeg as both Fort High and Neelin (Brandon) have lengthy travel times.
Led by quarterback Brady Meeks, who was named the player-of-the-game for the Muskies in their season-opening 29-7 loss to the Springfield Collegiate Sabres back on Sept. 14, he helped his squad score 44 straight points to pull out the win.
The Spartans led 12-6 after the first quarter and held a significant amount of momentum throughout the first 18 minutes of play, stretching the lead to 18-6 at one point thanks in large part to versatile running back/linebacker Levi Kanski, who finished the game with 154 yards and two scores on just five carries.
However, he left the game at halftime due to injury and his departure likely played a role in the final score.
On the other side, Meeks turned on the jets and had multiple runs that went for big yardage toward the end of the first half, including a 70-yard touchdown as the Muskies took a 19-18 lead into halftime.
“We took a couple of bad penalties on defence which gave them some early life,” Davis said of why the Muskies were down early in the first half.
“But then after that we felt we could move the ball well and we rolled with that into halftime and carried on with that.”
Meeks was even more dangerous in the second half as the pivot helped his team outscore Neelin 31-7, with Meeks ending the night with 120 yards rushing on just four carries as well as 133 yards through the air and four touchdowns.
The Spartans’ final touchdown in the fourth quarter did come off a lengthy kick return, but Davis was mostly pleased with his squad’s performance on Thursday.
“I was pretty happy with how they played overall and we even got some of the younger kids in at the end of the game,” he recalled.
“They did well when they went in too, so all-round it was a happy bus ride home and hopefully we can keep it going this Friday.”
Aside from Meeks, a player that really caught Davis’s attention with his play was running back Sean Huziak, who Davis figures had over 200 yards rushing in the win.
But Davis also lauded the efforts of his whole roster.
“It was pretty much a whole team effort, I mean everyone made some mistakes, but our running backs got a lot of yards running but you can’t get those kind of yards without the offensive line blocking,” he stressed.
“They did exceptionally well and had less mistakes than they made last week.”
