INNISFAIL – It wasn't pretty and it's doubtful scouts are chomping at the bit over the skill shown on the field, but the defending three-peat champion Innisfail Cyclones did win their first game of the season.
The Cyclones defeated the Strathmore Badgers 32 – 6 before an excited home field crowd on Sept. 2. They led 19 – 0 at the half, added another six in the third quarter, before adding one more converted touchdown in the fourth quarter.
The Badgers are the same team the Cyclones routed 67 – 6 last Nov. 5 in the Mountain View 9 Man Football Conference final. And while a 32 – 6 win over the Badgers to start the 2017 season may seem convincing enough, head coach Trevor Wooff served notice there is plenty of work to do and experience to gain. He gave his team a rating of seven out of 10.
“Defence was pretty good, special teams were pretty good. We didn't give up a lot of points and didn't have a huge amount of penalties,” said Wooff. “Those are things we can fix and clean up for next time.”
Wooff did note things did not start off well for his Cyclones, with players getting testy with each other for making mistakes by not executing on-field assignments. He said the coaches were forced to step in and calm the players down.
“We started off pretty rocky and we were making mistakes and there were some errors and jitters. We've got a fairly young team compared to the last couple of years, lots of Grade 10s, so there's new people that have not played before,” said Wooff, adding his players did make the necessary adjustments after the coaches stepped in. “We've got three or four absolute rookies that have never played the game before.”
While he did like how his defence performed, he pointed out it does take an offence more time to “perfect,” to get its timing in sync.
“We have more work to do with our timing. We were a little bit off with our throws not quite being there, and some of our guys giving up on the pass,” said Wooff. “We have a lot of work to do on our blocking assignments up front.”
As for quarterback, the defending champs of the five-team league are relying on Brett Fox, a Grade 11 student at Innisfail High School who was the Cyclones' backup last year.
“He's a smart kid. He's got some good talent. He knows the game and the offence,” said Wooff, who classified Fox's first 2017 game as “pretty good.”
“I didn't call all the plays for him. He called some of the plays. Some of them worked, some of them didn't. We had a few discussions on the side that ‘you got to do this differently, you have got to do that' or on that situation you can't call it that way.
“He is still learning,” added Wooff. “For the most part he played pretty good.”
The Cyclones' next game is in Didsbury on Sept. 16 where they will play a team that has a combined roster of Didsbury and Bowden players. Innisfail's next home game is Oct. 14 when they play Sundre.
"We were a little bit off with our throws not quite being there, and some of our guys giving up on the pass. We have a lot of work to do on our blocking assignments up front."
