The YRHS Jr. Raider football team is starting to make a name for themselves as the Regina Minor Football Bantam Division comeback kids after they once again took victory from the jaws of defeat Saturday night in Regina, this time coming back from a 12-point deficit at halftime to win convincingly, 40-26 over the Regina Packers.
鈥淚鈥檓 not going to lie, I wish we were winning at halftime and then could carry it throughout the game, but this team, these guys don鈥檛 know the meaning of the word quit,鈥� laughed YRHS Jr. Raider head coach Al Kyle. 鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 matter what the obstacle is, they seem to persevere through and play right until the end of the game.鈥�
Down 20-8 at halftime the Jr. Raiders could have easily folded up their tents and went home. Instead the young Raiders rallied around their leader, quarterback Jordin Rusnack, and went to work, cutting into the Packer lead with a touchdown and a two-point conversion to make the score 20-16.
Then, with the score still 20-16 Rusnack, who also handles the punting duties, turned what seemed to be a turnover-on-downs on the Raider 18-yard line into...the biggest offensive play of the season, bobbling the shotgun snap and turning the mistake into six points, eluding every Packer player on the field for a 90-plus yard touchdown run and a 24-20 Yorkton Regional lead. 鈥淗e always seems to make a play when the time is right for us,鈥� offered coach Kyle on his quarterback/punter. 鈥淲henever we need something big, he always seems to come through for us.鈥�
Rusnack also came through two more times on the night for a total of three touchdowns, while running back Braden Kitchen scored a pair of touchdowns as well in the eventual 40-26 Jr. Raider victory.
Also factoring heavily in the win was the play of second year Jr. Raider linebacker Zack Fleury, who coach Kyle feels is one of the top defensive players in the league. 鈥淗e (Fleury) is a really strong player and he played a really strong game. He had a couple of really huge hits out there and on one of our kickoffs he actually recovered an onside kick for us to keep our offence on the field and keep the momentum going for our team,鈥� mentioned Kyle, continuing, 鈥淗e鈥檚 a grade 10 kid and he was our Rookie of the Year last year and has turned into a middle linebacker which is a very important position for us and he鈥檚 really growing into the role for us as the season progresses.
鈥淗e was in on at least 10 tackles, recovered a fumble and he laid a couple of big hits that let the other team know that they have to keep their head up when they are running the ball his way.鈥�
Kyle also feels that the extra practice time his team had to prepare for this game was also a big reason why the Jr. Raiders were able to walk away victorious on Saturday night. 鈥淲e got in a couple of packages that we hadn鈥檛 been able to get in so far because we had three games in eight days to open the season,鈥� mentioned the Jr. Raider bench boss. 鈥淭his time we actually got in our goal-line or full house package that mostly consists of running so that was huge, and we were just able to add a couple of plays that were really able to help us this week especially because of how bad the weather was.鈥�
Next action
The next action for the YRHS Jr. Raiders (2-1-1) will be this Saturday when they host the Regina Eagles at Century Field. Kickoff is set for high noon, 12:00pm.
