The Estevan Lions Club bantam Oilers fell 9-0 to the Swift Current Steelers in their Moose Jaw Minor Football League (MJMFL) home opener at Woodlawn Field on Saturday.
“We took strides in the right direction,” said Paul Duncan, head coach of the Oilers. “Our defence played an outstanding game. Our offence, we have a lot of first-year players on the offence, so they did a really good job of gelling together as the game went on. We’ll have to work in that area and progress a little bit more, but overall I was extremely happy with what we did.”
The Steelers gained their first two points on a first quarter safety with the Oilers pinned deep in their zone and electing to give up the points and kick the ball out into the field. Both teams then settled into a defensive standoff with the Steelers only gaining an edge near the end of the third quarter scoring a touchdown and knocking in the convert.
“Basically one play would have turned it around, which was nice to see,” said Duncan. “It was really good for them to stay in it and see what it takes to stay competitive with a good team.”
Duncan said the Oilers are settling into their regular schedule of three days of practice before game days after completing a rigorous training camp over the past two weeks that saw the players do five days of work in their first week of the season and four days of practice in the second week. He said in each successive week they’ll now be working on adding to their playbook with a hope that a spot near the top of the MJMFL will be the result at the end of the season.
“I would like to see us finish the season with a winning record,” he said. “It is something we are definitely capable of. Our defence will hold us in games and as the offence progresses we’ve got a lot of weapons that are on there.”
