The Sacred Heart Jr. Saints football team wrapped up their 2015 football season with a respectable 2-3-1 record through six nine-man games, tying Esterhazy while picking up wins over Moosomin at home and Esterhazy under the lights on the road.
The Jr. Saints fell to Melville twice and Moosomin once, the latter wrapping up their 2015 campaign. 鈥淚t was a really good season for us this year,鈥� said Jr. Saints co-coach Cory Johnson, adding that the Jr. Saints were made up primarily of grade eight students from the four Yorkton Catholic schools. 鈥淎 lot of our kids are young. We have a lot of kids coming back too, because a lot of them were in grade eight this year.
鈥淎 lot of them really stepped up. It was a really good year because it was kind of a rebuild for that junior program this year.鈥�
Offensively the Jr. Saints were led all season long by young quarterback Matt Stackhouse, as well as running back Kelsey Valuck.
Matthew Cochrane, who spent time as both a quarterback and a wide receiver, also helped the Jr. Saint offence find the end zone several times this year.
On the defensive side of the ball, coach Johnson said that three players in particular led the way, with Brendan Hunko, Eliah Stephaniuk and Kael DePape all keeping the opposition off the scoreboard.
Johnson said that while the players aren鈥檛 too happy with the season being over without any sort of playoffs, that鈥檚 just the nature of the league right now. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e upset that the season is finished with no playoff scenario, but that鈥檚 kind of the way the junior thing is right now.
鈥淭hey learnt a lot of fundamentals and learnt a lot about leadership and how to work in a group together and that鈥檚 what this program is about because it鈥檚 really their first or second year playing it for the most part.鈥�
The Jr. Saint co-coach then went on to say that, while the season is over for the majority of the Jr. Saints, a few of them will still be seeing action as members of the Sacred Heart Sr. Saints football team. 鈥淲e will have three possibly four players finishing the season with the senior Saints,鈥� suggested Johnson. 鈥淲e had three travel with the seniors on Friday in Esterhazy and we鈥檝e had a couple play most of the season with them already.鈥�
Set to play for the Sr. Saints are Stephaniuk, Valuck and Cochrane, all of whom have already spent time with the big club this season.
Overall Johnson said that he and his fellow coaches (Dean DePape, Darryl Struble and Nick Jonassen) are all very satisfied and proud to see how the season panned out. 鈥淲e couldn鈥檛 ask for anything more. The effort these kids put in from day one was great and they really came together,鈥� said Johnson. 鈥淭hey bought in to what we were teaching them and they picked up everything very quickly. Their skillsets really developed over the season and we really had a good year.鈥�
