Muskie squad set for gridiron opener

All of the drills and run-throughs the Muskie football team has been working on for the last couple of weeks will be put to test here tomorrow when Fort High kicks off its 2012 WHSFL campaign.
The black-and-gold, who again are competing in Andy Currie ‘A’ Division, will open play against the Elmwood Giants at 3 p.m., which was moved up from the originally-scheduled start time of 5 p.m.

“The start time was switched to help and accommodate the team coming from Winnipeg, and allow them to get back home at an earlier hour,” noted Muskie head coach Chad Canfield.
With a bird’s-eye view in watching his team prepare for tomorrow’s game, Canfield has been pleased with the progress so far, especially with the number of players on the roster compared to previous seasons.
“The nice thing about us this year is that we don’t have any two-way starters, which has been a goal of mine since I started coaching here two years ago,” he remarked.
“Even though I would obviously still like to see more players out there, we can go 12-on-12 on both offence and defence out there and be effective at it.”
In their most recent meeting here last October, the Giants laid a 39-1 thumping on the Muskies, which was part of Elmwood’s run to the Currie Division final, where they lost to the Sisler ‘A’ Spartans.
“We’ll take a look at what they did last year from the tape that we still have and get a concept idea of what they do,” Canfield explained.
“Last year, Elmwood ran everything through their running back [Jayde Erasmo] as he played both ways, returned kicks, and even kicked the ball on field goals, so he was a huge part of their overall game plan,” he noted.
“Now that he’s moved on from the program, they [Elmwood] are probably the toughest team to take a look at heading into the first week of the year.”
This season also sees the number of teams in the Currie Division expanded from eight to 11, with the Kenora Broncos, Neelin Spartans, and Steinbach Spartans all moving down from the Kas Vidruk ‘AA’ ranks.
“Those three new teams are going to be the wild cards this year as they come into the division,” Canfield said.
“It’ll be interesting to see how they all do, and I know that Kenora has already played Dryden in an exhibition game and beat them pretty handily.
“It’s one of those things where things change in the league from year to year when it comes to the rosters anyways, so I hope that the division stays pretty even,” he added.