NEWS PHOTO JAMES TUBB
Brandon Smeed of the McCoy Colts corrals a pass in the Colts 32-21 win Friday night against the Taber Rebels.
The McCoy Colts scored early and held on late to beat Taber 32-21 and get the win Friday night.
It was their first victory on the year.
For Colt’s head coach Darrell Grass, the win comes from his team growing in every previous game.
“It’s progression not perfection. It’s good to see the steps that we took and the kids are happy, you can see that. I know I’m happy,” Grass said. “We still have got lots of work to do but a wins a win and we gotta take it.”
It was a quiet first half for both teams with only the Colts getting a one point safety from Taber. But after that, McCoy took over the second quarter. Rylan Hodgson got the first touchdown of the game for the Colts and Logan Schlosser added the second TD not long after. The Rebels added their own TD in the quarter to get within 10.
In the third quarter, the Colts had an early field goal to extend their lead to 17-7 and Taber followed up with a QB run to bring the game tight. But it was the closest they would get to tying it up.
McCoy blew it open with a 80-yard rushing touchdown by Colton Robinson.
“That’s priceless,” Grass said. “The guy’s fast so we finally broke him for one and he’s exhausted, he played his guts out today. Colton gets a big hand and a double thumbs up from me, that’s for sure.”
For the Grade 12 student, the run was great but wasn’t just because of him.
“I’m feeling pretty good but it’s all thanks to my team,” Robinson said. “They did really good tonight and they allowed me to do that.”
The Colts would add another TD from Hodgson in the fourth quarter to put the game away and secure their win. The victory is just a starting point for Robinson who says his team can get better from here.
“I’m feeling pretty good and I think we can really grow on this and improve as a team,” he said. “We’ve done so much, we’ve been improving this season and I’m just so happy to see everyone around me improving and the team really coming together.”
For Grass, one of the stories with his team this season has been keeping the momentum and not getting down on themselves. He has said before his team would make a mistake and would focus on it instead of getting up and moving on and that it was something they would have to learn to do. He said they did just that tonight.
“There was a couple wobbles and giving momentum back,” Grass said. “But they came back, they played well. We talked about taking it to them on the first drive of the second half and we did. That kills a team when they are down… it’s good. I’m proud of the boys, they worked hard.”
Across the field, Taber head coach Jason Jensen said he’s obviously not pleased with losing but still saw positives for his team.
“I’m not happy with the loss but there were a lot of little mistakes and things like that in that game I think we could have cleaned up,” Jensen said. “…This is a heck of a team, they’re well coached. We knew we were in for a dog fight, that’s what we got. There’s some positives I could take away, there’s lots we have to work on but we’ve got a lot of season left. I’m glad we got this game out of them.”
The Colts have a bye next week as they are looking ahead to their matchup against Brooks on Oct. 15, their final game of the regular season.
McCoy will be taking part in a controlled scrimmage with the Crescent Heights Vikings on Monday. It’s something Grass has done twice now as a way to work on things with his team at close to game speed but in a safe, manageable way.
“We want to do well against those guys, Brooks is always tough,” Grass said. “We’re going to watch some film, we’ll have that time luxury during the week because we have that extra day. Keep practices a bit shorter for this week coming up and then move onto regular game prep.”
