WEYBURN – The Weyburn Comp Eagles football team capitalized on key mistakes by the Yorkton Raiders and made plays at the right time to come away with a 52-14 victory on Saturday afternoon at Darold Kot Field.
This gave the Eagles the 5A Rural league title for the second year in a row, and just like a year ago, they will go on to play the Greenall Griffins in Regina on Saturday, Nov. 5. The game is set for Leibel Field, with kickoff at 1 p.m., not at Mosaic Stadium as has been reported.
Weyburn had a strong performance to win the provincial title in 2021, and earned the right to defend their title with a strong offensive effort against the Raiders.
“It was an outstanding game for us. We had our leaders step up and make a difference all game long. We worked on a game plan as coaches and the kids bought into it all week and executed it perfectly,” said head coach Jody Kerr.
“It wasn’t the game we expected, as I thought it would come down to the final possession, but our young men just brought their best on Saturday and the result speaks for itself.”
Yorkton made some mistakes on key plays, such as in one play where the Yorkton kicker made an error, giving Weyburn excellent field position that ended in a touchdown.
Conner Kerr went six for nine passes for 95 yards, including two touchdowns and an interception, and Nolan Uhren passed once for five yards.
Isaiah Sanderson caught two passes for 47 yards and scored a touchdown; Kalin Berg caught two for 34 yards; Ryder Knox caught a pass for nine yards; Kerr caught one pass for five yards, and Uhren caught one pass for five yards and scored a touchdown, and the team had a total of 100 yards in passing.
On the ground, Owen Istace had 21 carries for 156 yards in rushing, and scored four touchdowns, while Xander Shane rushed three times for 53 yards, and scored one touchdown.
In addition, Carter Bell ran seven times for four yards total; and Sanderson ran once for two yards, while Berg ran once for a loss of four yards. The team had a total of 224 yards in rushing.
Kerr made two interceptions, gaining five yards with one and 27 yards with the second one, and he rushed five times for 13 yards.
In the kicking department, Carter Houghton made one field goal and was blocked in another attempt; he made six touchdown converts, and kicked an average of 30.7 yards per punt. Kerr also made one punt for 37 yards.
Late in the game, a major penalty by Yorkton saw the Eagles move down to the five-yard line, and an objectionable conduct penalty by the Yorkton bench moved them halfway to the goal line. In addition, a Yorkton fan was ejected at the same time for verbally abusing the referees.
“For this weekend, Balgonie is a good football team and will be looking to revenge our game last year in the provincial final. They have shown all year that they have great players and a great coaching staff, and we look forward to another tilt between leagues on Saturday,” said Kerr.
“For us to be successful and advance to the provincial championship, we have to keep improving and be better then we were versus Yorkton. If we can do that, we will put ourselves in a position to win.”
Weyburn Comp principal Ryan Fowler presented each player with medals, along with the 5A Rural League trophy as the players celebrated the big win.
