Seizing the moment
Spartans swing momentum with touchdown late in first half to complete three-peat
CORNWALL – Sam Friesen is elusive and patient.
The third-year member of the SGK Atlantic Summerside Spartans capped his bantam football career Saturday by running for a couple of touchdowns and catching another. It helped propel his team to a 33-0 victory over the Charlottetown Silver Privateers in the Ed Hilton Bowl of the Papa John’s Football P.E.I. championship Saturday at the Terry Fox Sports Complex in Cornwall.
“I feel proud,” Friesen said after the game while standing near head coach Brian Goguen. “It feels great, but I’m going to miss this team and miss this coach.” Goguen, who has coached the Spartans for four years, said it was a great way to end the season.
“You’re just so proud of them. They pour their heart out every single time they show up on that field,” he said. “They just had a great
year and a great finish.”
Friesen broke a couple of long runs for scores during the game, but they didn’t look good early.
He broke left, only to be stopped.
He went right, only to be met by Privateers’ defenders.
He cut back to the middle and waited for a hole to appear.
“I just keep going, zigzagging until I find my way,” Friesen said. “When there’s an open zone, I just head towards that zone and just go.”
All the time he was moving to keep the play alive, his teammates worked to create a seam to spring him for a score. And they did it without drawing a penalty flag to negate a positive play.
“Our coaches are good at teaching us how to block,” Friesen said, noting they worked on it a lot during the past week. “We showed it out here today.”
A key moment came in the dying seconds of the first half. Summerside was clinging to a 7-0 lead with the ball.
The Spartans ran their Wildcat Special play where Cole Holland tossed the ball down the sidelines and Friesen hauled it in for the major with 1.2 seconds on the clock.
“No. 8 (Ben Wohlgemut) played great defence. … I don’t know how I got it,” Friesen said.
Goguen said during the regular season the Spartans ran a Wildcat play where quarterback Zachary Connell would take a step to the right and the ball would be snapped to Holland, who played quarterback two years ago and has a strong arm.
“All season we were running that play, but then we saw the DBs (and) we saw the linebackers biting on the run, so we just call it the Wildcat Special,” Goguen explained. “There were only (a few) seconds left in the half, so we said, ‘Just let it fly’.”
Friesen said the score swung momentum in their favour.
“It was good because after that the team got hyped up and started moving and blocking and scoring, so it set a good tone for the team.”
He would hit paydirt again on the second play of the second half as the defending champs extended the lead to 21 and never looked back.
Charlottetown had its chances, including marching the ball to the one-yard line on its opening possession, but couldn’t cash in.
“Hats off to Summerside for a game well played today. … They stopped us when they needed to,” Privateers head coach Justin Dunn said.
He was proud of his charges, many who were playing tackle football for the first season and can return to bantam next year.
“They left it all out on the field. I don’t know if the scoreboard reflected some of the great plays,” he said. “They’ll be hungry and ready to go (in 2021) and that much more experienced.”
Carter Lawless scored two touchdowns in the win, including giving his team the lead in the second quarter. Friesen was named the offensive player of the game while Charlottetown’s Matthew Koritansky took home the honours for the defence.