Lions Tame Bulldogs — MJ Independent

Tuesday night’s matchup between U12 rivals the Bulldogs and the Lions was a tale of two halves.

The first half saw the Lions dominate the majority of the play while in the second half the Bulldogs started to come alive.

The Lions led 12 - 0 after the first quarter going on to hold a 31 - 0 lead over the Bulldogs at half time.

The Lions were held off the scoreboard in the third quarter a favour they returned to the Bulldogs. The third quarter score was 31 - 0 in the Lions favour.

The teams started scoring in the fourth quarter with the final score Lions 37 and the Bulldogs 6.

Despite their problems there were some strongpoints for the Bulldogs on the field.

None more so than quarterback Liam Adrian.

Adrian showed his prowess in passing and heads up play to think past problems to successfully rush the ball in key situations.

“We didn’t play the best but we’ll get them next time,” Adrian said about the team’s effort on Tuesday evening.

“Our receivers ran some good routes. We had some good blocking,” he said about his ability to make some longer passes.

About being trapped with nobody to pass to he said “I saw some holes so I just took it and ran.”

Bulldogs head coach Josh Sigurdson called it a frustrating outing for the Bulldogs.

“I found it frustrating. I truly think we beat ourselves tonight. With that being said we did challenge our kids to step up in the second half and they did that. We are a young team but that is not an excuse for the lack of effort we put in,” Sigurdson said.

“These are great kids. They are very talented and they are very smart. It’s just sometimes we defeat ourselves and that’s what happened tonight,” he said.

Sigurdson said second year U12 player Adrian is a smart player and a key to the Bulldogs but the team needs to go beyond his talents.

“We need to learn to win without him. He can’t do everything.”

He said the team has to learn a basic philosophy to make it through the rest of the season.

“I think there is a lot we did right and a lot we did wrong but just focusing on the fundamentals of football. And wanting to play good football is going to be our key down the stretch.”

Kellyn Bollinger, head coach of the Lions, said he was very happy with how the game played out and the final score.

“That was awesome. I thought it was a really great game for both sides. It was nice to play a game where we were getting thumped a little bit and they were getting thumped a little bit,” Bollinger said.

“It was a really good physical game.”

Icing sore hands - MJ Independent photo

Despite excelling in most categories on the field one area they were behind the Bulldogs on was passing.

“Their quarterback can really fling that ball. We don’t throw it as much so we don’t practice against it as much. I think they got their eyes opened what that QB can do. But he can really throw the ball. They’ve got a good passing attack.”

Asked which was better in the evening Bollinger gave the slim edge to the defence.

“I think our defence really stepped up. They were all running for the ball. They’ve didn’t give away anything easy. Even in the passes were over our heads they’d still track them down.”