Vikings And Raiders Stage Defensive Battle

Billed as a clash of the titans the matchup between the U14 Vikings and U14 Raiders was right out of the 1960s Batman series with booms, kapows and smacks graphics flashing across the screen.

The two undefeated U14 teams had a lot on the line.

It was a defensive battle with a lot of crashing that when the dust settled the Vikings defeated the Raiders 18 - 6.

“It was ugly from start to finish. Our defence held us in it and our offence couldn’t get anything going,” Zachary Klyne head coach of the Raiders said, adding “it was ugly.”

Klyne said the Raiders being the first team to score against the Vikings wasn’t a big deal.

“Honestly it was a broken play it didn’t mean much. Our quarterback made a heck of a play he ran 70 yards for a touchdown but our offence couldn’t get moving. We were lucky Griffin had a good game he just made something out of nothing,” he said.

In the week running up to this coming weekend’s re-match Klyne said the Raiders would be working on everything - offence, defence and special teams.

“ We’re playing them next week will come on a different game plan and see what we can do.”

He calls the coming week of practices the busiest yet for the team.

“We’ve got to get going.”

Klyne said he would like to give a shout out to the defence.

“Our defence played a heck of a game. They’re a good team they usually score 40 points but we held them to 18 so thanks to our defence for keeping us in it at least.”

“It was a tough battle,” Brock Montgomery coach of the U14 Vikings said.

“Itwas a good game. It’s exactly what I expected it to be. The Raiders are a good team an coached well. It came down to who was going to score in the fourth(quarter) so that’s what happened,” Montgomery said.

He said the Raiders have a strong defence to go up against.

“There defence is good. They’ve got big kids all across the board. They’ve got some good athletes out there so nothing surprised us in how well they played. We didn’t execute as well as we wanted to, but it’s something to work on this week,” he said.

The Vikings were no slouch on defence.

“Our defence played tough. I rely on them a lot and they work hard. They’re a good unit and they played well.”

“They needed to today.

Montgomery said the Vikings were expecting a close game.

“I expected it to be close. We were missing some kids tonight…this was a game we thought we might have to chip away at and it might not be as pretty as we like. But the kids stuck with it to the end.”

Asked how it felt to finally have points scored against them after three weeks Montgomery laughed saying he didn’t like it as a defensive coach.

“It’s hard to keep that team off of the board.”