It’s a bad news, good news situation for the Foothills Eagles.
After producing an undefeated regular season in the Calgary Bantam Football Association, the Eagles suffered their first loss in the playoff opener dropping the Tier I tilt 40-38 to the Calgary Stampeders on Oct. 16 at Shouldice Park to move into the Tier II bracket of the postseason.
“We knew we can’t take any team lightly in the playoffs,” said Eagles head coach Tim Henderson. “We beat this team earlier in the year, but that’s not the attitude we had, that just because we beat them we can expect to do that again.
“We knew they were going to be tough and well-coached and it’s unfortunate that we gave up some big plays.”
The Stampeders preserved the victory with a block of a point-after attempt in the final 35 seconds after Foothills wide receiver Ben Gutek ran into the end-zone for what was poised to be a game-tying touchdown run.
The Eagles were down eight points with just 92 seconds on the clock.
“All season long, we don’t punt that much and I have a lot of faith in our offence that we will get first downs,” said Henderson. “I think we all knew we would score if we got the ball again.
“And we’ve been perfect on our converts, somehow their guy got 10-feet taller and was able to block that kick and to end our goal of Tier I like that, it really sucks.”
The Stampeders took a 24-16 lead into the half with both squads finding success in the running game.
Foothills tailback Seth Poelzer and Gutek provided the first-half touchdowns with quarterback Emerson Liepert and slotback Jack Bjorge also chewing up yardage on the ground.
“We knew we could run against them, we knew that we could run hard up the middle and get outside and we knew that we could kill the clock,” the coach added. “That was our gameplan, to manage the clock and offensively we did that.
“We didn’t think they were going to run like that, they haven’t done that all year long so they maybe caught us a little off guard.”
Lincoln Stewart and Liepert added second-half touchdowns as the Eagles and Stampeders traded scores leading to the nailbiter finish.
With the loss, the Eagles are now in the Tier II bracket and will meet the Cochrane Lions on Oct. 22 in a win-or-go-home clash.
“You’ve got to keep their heads up,” Henderson said. “We had a goal to win Tier I, they had a goal, we had a goal as coaches and we couldn’t get it. We just have to tell them you guys are better than what we saw today and now we have to go into Tier II and have to play hard and get angry.”
The Eagles entered the playoffs as the league’s only undefeated squad, leading the Brock Jacobs Division with an 8-0 mark. Foothills paced the 12-team loop with 386 points over its eight wins.
“It just all came together,” Henderson said. “We had the right runningbacks, receivers and quarterback, incredible offensive line with three new to football linemen.
“And we knew that through spring camp and leading into the season, there’s something really good here, a lot of strong and fast offensive guys. And we did lean more to the offensive side, we knew we would score and just had a lot of confidence in the group we have.”
Stressing the strong team dynamic, cohesiveness and character of the team, Henderson said the group will respond positively to the playoff adversity.
“There’s a lot of football experienced guys, a lot of leaders on this team,” he said. “They’ll go home and be mad and lick their wounds and all of that, but they don’t want to finish playing football, they want to keep going. And we have a lot of leaders on this team who won’t let this loss get to the rest of the group.”
