The Foothills Falcons saw their provincial dreams dashed by the aerial attack of the Springbank Phoenix.
Foothills was ousted from the Tier II playoffs 17-10 by a resilient Springbank team who erased a 10-7 deficit in the final three minutes of the fourth quarter in the regional qualifier, Nov. 3 at Shouldice Park in Calgary.
“That was quite a game,” said Phoenix head coach Tony Lucas. “Our defence didn’t give them much. They got one nice touchdown drive. Apart from that they really didn’t get much. Eventually we got some points, I didn’t know if the points were going to come.”
Foothills carried a modest 3-0 lead after two quarters of eventful play that happened everywhere but on the scoreboard.
Falcons quarterback and place-kicker Taylor Armsworthy staked the team to a 3-0 lead on a 30-yard field goal in the closing stages of the first quarter.
The Grade 12 gunslinger marched the Falcons down the field again and took off for a red-zone scamper, but was stripped of the ball at the goal line and the opportunistic Phoenix defence recovered in the end zone. Springbank would get into field-goal range, but clanked their 20-yard kick off the post.
The teams exchanged several turnovers in the quarter, with Falcons cornerback Hunter Karl picking off three passes from Phoenix quarterback Levi Jackson.
After Armsworthy threw his first pick of the game, Karl took over behind centre for the second and third quarter, but the Falcons were dogged by penalties and failed to mount scoring drives.
“It was more so to maximize our ability to do different things at different times and we obviously have two great athletes that can do a lot of things for us and we were trying to find some consistency,” Falcons head coach Greg McLeod said of the quarterback switch. “Taylor hadn’t played great the last two games.”
Springbank took the lead when they gambled on third and eleven and Jackson found Kevin Natenstedt for a 42-yard catch and run.
“We were just going for it,” Lucas said. “We thought we saw something we could exploit."
Armsworthy was put back in at quarterback to start the fourth quarter and re-ignited the Falcons offence by finding Brenden Hansen for a 10-yard toss to give Foothills the 10-7 lead with just under eight minutes on the clock. However, Armsworthy was injured on the play as he was hit hard while releasing the ball and was forced to watch the rest of the game from the sidelines with a suspected concussion.
Springbank had to settle for three points after Karl made a pair of terrific pass deflections and on third-down the Phoenix nailed a 35-yard field goal to tie the game with 2:12 left.
With Foothills driving after the three-minute warning the Falcons elected to go for a fake punt on third down at their own 30 yard line and T.J. Tighe ran to the inside for the first down.
Facing an almost identical scenario, and with just 45 seconds on the clock, on third and 10 the Falcons again went for it rather than punt and were stopped short of the yards and turned the ball over on downs.
On the next play from scrimmage Jackson found Adel Boussenane wide open on the left and the receiver ran in for the touchdown to clinch the 17-10 win.
Following the game, McLeod took the blame for the call on third down.
“That was an absolute bonehead call that I’m going to regret for a long time,” McLeod said. “We were talking it was just one of those things, but there’s no excuse.”
McLeod didn’t want to use injuries as an excuse, but the Falcons were missing several key cogs on offence.
Fleet-footed receiver and safety Rory Forrester went down with an early first half injury, while Tighe’s reps were limited due to a pinched nerve.
The Falcons coach credited his defence for putting forth a much-improved effort from the week prior when they posted a 49-30 loss to Rundle College.
However, he lamented that some of the team’s bad habits from the season came to the forefront in the playoff opener.
“We’ve had some problems all year and that might be a factor with a young team, but we’ve had problems getting guys to take ownership with some game prep and asking guys to do some work on their own,” McLeod said. “That’s something that a large group of our guys haven’t done a good job of.”
Ending their season at this stage would not have been foreseen weeks ago.
The Falcons had a promising start to the year earning a blowout victory over the defending Tier I champion Harry Ainlay Titans and went undefeated in the regular season of the Big Rock Football Conference.
“In terms of what we did off the field this year I couldn’t have been prouder of the guys, they’ve done a lot of good things in building the community,” McLeod said of the Falcons’ involvement in the community and in charitable settings. “But ultimately we are a football team and want to be revered for what we do on the field and we came out really well this year, but it just puttered out and it’s disappointing.”
The loss marked the end of the high school careers for five vital members of the Falcons in Armsworthy, defensive linemen Ryan Cole and Jamie Irving, Reece Girardin and Jake Hunter, who missed most of the season after suffering a broken arm in a pre-season tilt.
McLeod said Armsworthy, a two-year starting quarterback, will be missed on the gridiron.
“He’s been great for us and the last of the Armsworthy boys to come through the program and arguably the best Armsworthy to come through the program,” McLeod said. “He’s a great football mind, he comes prepared every week and eats, breathes, sleeps football and he’s going to do well at the next level.”
The Falcons coach also looked to a bright future for Foothills, noting his team will bring back the lion’s share of its players for next season.
“The good thing is we’re still a young team,” he said. “We were very much a Grade 11 team this year.”
