A balanced attack has the Foothills Division II Lions on the front foot.
The visiting Lions erased a halftime deficit to pick up a comfortable 34-24 win over the Lethbridge Rugby Club on Saturday to kick-off their Calgary Rugby Union slate in fine form.
“The 40 minutes to end the first half and start the second half, it was almost like the light bulb went on once we started running our patterns how well it started working,” said Lions coach Jim Ryan. “We were running in pods of two forwards together and ran a lot of forward play and that led to getting it wide and spinning it out to our backs and our backs were running really well.
“It was a good team effort all around.”
Momentum swings characterized the first half before Foothills took control of the game with a strong stretch of play despite going into the break down 12-10.
“We were on the back foot for probably the first 20 minutes and absorbing a lot of pressure,” Ryan said. “Then the last 20 minutes of the first half and first 20 minutes of the second half we were all over them and that’s pretty much where we scored all our points.”
Foothills received contributions from all over the pitch in securing 34 points. Scrum-half Kevan Yeats led the charges with two trys, along with singles from winger Mike Rinvold, full-back and club captain Nathan Marquardt as well as forwards Kris Locke and Jordan Smith.
“(Rinvold) had a fantastic game. He went for several long runs out on the wing and Kevan Yeats had a lot of good runs too,” said Ryan, who noted the scrumhalf has adjusted nicely to his new position. “He has the best pass on our team by far, a great delivery.”
The Lions’ backs also played with renewed maturity and were able to shake off a try Foothills threw directly into the hands of Lethbridge.
“I thought the biggest difference was our backs played with confidence,” Lions forward Darcy Gallant said. “When we passed it to them and they scored, last year our spirit would have been broken and then the forwards would give up on it and get angry.”
The opening victory also marked a promising display from the Lions in adjusting nicely to the new systems implemented by first-year coach Ryan.
“The game plan Jim has us running, the system, our offensive scheme plan, for our first time running it as a group I thought we did pretty good,” Gallant said. “We rucked well, our scrums were really good.”
In Division III action, the Lions’ season opener with the Calgary Saints was cancelled due to the latter’s decision not to field a team in the division this year.
Both Lions teams return to the foothills for home openers versus the visiting Red Deer Titans on May 11. The Division III game goes at noon followed shortly by the Tier II contest at 1:45 p.m. Both games are at the John Paul II Collegiate field in Okotoks.
For more information on the Lions visit foothillslionsrugbyclub.ca
