Muskies sacked in quarter-finals

The Muskie football team left the gridiron for the final time this season after losing 37-0 to the Kelvin Clippers last Thursday in Winnipeg to open the WHSFL playoffs.
“I think it’s a young team against a more experienced team,” offered Muskie head coach Vince Gouin. “The boys played very well overall, but defensively the kids just missed tackles.
“They [the Clippers] have a nice running back and he made nice moves, and the boys just missed their tackles,” he added.
The Muskies finished the regular season in the basement of the Kas Vidruk Division at 0-7, which meant they had to face the first-place Clippers (6-1) in the quarter-finals.
Despite the loss, the game did have its share of moral victories. For one, the black-and-gold kept the Clippers out of their end zone in the first quarter.
The lofty 37-point margin was a victory itself, as it was a far cry from the numbing 65-0 score inflicted on the Muskies by Kelvin during their regular-season match-up just two games prior.
Fort High again was done in by an offence unable to find ways around their opponents.
Gouin said one of the factors was the handling of the football by quarterback Blake Wepruk, who bumbled with a similarly slick ball the previous week against the lowly Kildonan East Reivers.
“Offensively, the receivers did a great job getting open, [we] just couldn’t get them the ball,” Gouin remarked.
“Blake had a difficult time. He had a tough first half, but I won’t pin it on any one player, of course,” Gouin added.
While the emphasis was on losing after the Muskies dropped their eighth-straight game on the season, the return of Mike Sande to the lineup was another victory in itself.
Sande was sidelined for the year with a knee injury and resigned to the role of a student coach.
But after being fitted with a leg brace earlier this month, he made good on his running joke of joining the team to play his last game as a Muskie.
“It went pretty good,” Sande said. “A little rough, of course.
“It was fun, though. I thought I played an all-right game,” he added. “I dunno, it was a little different . . . it was kind of weird just knowing it could be my last football game.
“Hopefully, I’ll get to go play somewhere else, like university or a rep team,” Sande continued.
He said the transition was smooth from the sidelines to free safety—and the experience as a coach aided his ability to read plays.
“You see the game a lot different. I learned a lot of things just watching from the sidelines,” Sande remarked. “I know what to look for, if it’s gonna be a run or pass.
“I felt like I could read the play better just being out on the field for the last game.”
With the playoffs over for the Muskies and nothing ahead in the long off-season, there’s little to do but look ahead to 2008.
Much of the team played their first competitive football this season, and while there were a number of third-year players on the squad, the seniors were relatively few.
“We’re not going to be losing a lot of players next year,” Gouin noted. “We will lose some key players—always do every year. But I think my expectations are high for the boys next year.”
“I think we’ll be a better team next year,” agreed Sande. “We had a lot of young guys on the team playing, learning new positions, but there wasn’t a lot of experience. There weren’t a lot of seniors on the team.
“I think we’ll have some experience [next year].”
Sande said the team’s young defensive corps will be stronger with a year’s experience under their belt, and also pointed to the passing game as an element with the potential to become a pillar for next season’s Muskie squad.
Gouin, meanwhile, said one of his off-season priorities will be to establish conditioning goals for the players.
He said he encourages his charges to become multi-sport athletes, and hopes to see many staying in shape representing Fort High in other endeavours.
And to those who might not see the good in a winless season, Gouin said there’s some definite upside.
“It was a good learning experience for all of them, and myself, of course, being a first-year coach,” he noted. “It’ll go well in the future.”