The high school football season came to an end a long time ago, but it came to an official close Friday night when the teams held their year-end awards banquet Friday night at the Yorkton Regional High School.
"What we do here is fun," claimed Roby Sharpe, coach of the school's football program, referring to the process that usually starts long before the pre-season, to the various ups and downs that come during the course of the season.
"It's not where you start in this league, it's where you finish."
In their playoff game, he said they were deadlocked at 0-0 going into the fourth quarter.
The cafeteria was packed full yet again as various coaches from three different ball clubs formally recognized the various accomplishments of their athletes.
First up was the recognition of the cities' youngest team, the Pee wee Gridders, coached by Jason Farrell.
Centre Jayden Rusnack took home the Rudy award, Darius Haberstock won the Defensive Player of the Year award, Brendon Weber won the Offensive award and Zach Kaise, although not present that night, won the team MVP award for his efforts playing various positions including tailback, slotback, fullback as well as linebacker and cornerback.
Farrell also announced that only six players are eligible to return next season due to the Regina Minor Football League's age restrictions.
The YRHS junior/bantam team award winners included Mike Kozushka, who was awarded the Lineman of the Year, teammate Tyrell Ulmer won Offensive Player of the Year.
In the only tie of the night, two players, Grey McKen and David Balysky co-won the Defensive Player of the Year prize while Dalton Fichtner was awarded the YRHS junior Most Valuable Player recognition.
Former Saskatchewan Roughrider and British Columbia Lion Brooks Findlay was on hand to talk about experiences he encountered going through university football as well as experiences with the CFL clubs.
Both the University of Washington Huskies and Nebraska Cornhuskers were interested in him before he signed with the Roughriders in 1993.
The end of the evening began with the recognition of all present YRHS seniors.
Head coach Roby Sharpe called the entire team to the front before handing out individual recognitions.
The Most Tenacious Tackler award, presented by Dean Bakke, went to son Dalton Bakke, who played all over the field this season, including middle linebacker, linebacker and safety. However a head injury kept the Raider utility out of action for the Johnson game, which was the most important win/game of the Raiders' season.
"It was tough being on the sidelines," Bakke recalled, who added that he relied on his teammates to get through that game which ended in a 29-0 YRHS win.
He was able to bounce back from the injury and dress for the playoffs.
During Friday's banquet, he acknowledged that although it was good to get the individual awards, it was more his hope that something would come along in the way of a team title, especially with his high school football career now officially done.
"It's a good way to end my Gr. 12 season," he said over the phone. "It's all good I guess, but it's a team game."
It was a good end for a solid season for Bakke, who had also been recognized by the Regina Intercollegiate Football League's league's banquet, amongst every other team's linebacker. He had another good night at the YRHS sports night.
It was said that Bakke once knocked an opponent so hard, he in turn, knocked himself out in the process.
He added that his final year in a YRHS football uniform will no doubt go down as his best, saying that in this past season, they didn't have any one go-to guy that they've had in past years.
That required the team to work even harder to keep everything together.
"Definitely Gr. 12 (year) was the best. Everybody came together as a team."
Other teammates recognized at the banquet included Kosta Stamatinos was one of two players to take home two awards, the Scholar award and the I Love Football award. Equipment manager Mike Brown was recognized with the Seagull award.
Sam Allarie won the Coaches' award, the Rudy award went to Daniel Brenner and Dustin Chase won the team's Most Improved Player award. Layne Hull was the Rookie of the Year and also was the recipient of the Huskie award, along with Ryan Nagy.
Both will be invited to the training camp of the University of Saskatchewan Huskies.
For his ability to play just about every position on the defensive line, including defensive end, nose tackle, defensive tackle and linebacker, Justin Schneider won the Lineman of the Year trophy.
Bakke also won the Defensive Player of the Year award, marked by the team's three shutouts in four games in the latter part of the season. The award was presented by defensive co-ordinator Ryan Effa.
Jake Prybylski was the Offensive Player of the Year, presented by offensive co-ordinator Jason Boyda and the YRHS Raider Most Valuable Player for the 2010 season went to Paul Toth.
