The Sports Corner

Give Mouat Hawks credit, they didn’t give up

There were times in Saturday’s 2009 Subway Bowl that the W.J. Mouat Hawks looked like they would go out the same way they did to the 2008 champs from Terry Fox.

Last year, they were demolished 57-16.

This year, it looked as if that might happen again to the Hawks, who were deemed to be the consensus choice for the underdog against the Centennial Centaurs in the days leading up to the championship game at McLeod Athletic Park on Saturday night.

They were down 13-0, 20-7, 26-7, 32-15 and 38-22 and yet the final score ended up 39-36 for the Centaurs when the clock struck midnight on the Hawks.

The Mouat defence was unable to stop the likes of Nehemie Kankolongo and Lemar Durant, so when the D was unable to make the big play, the Hawks offence just seemed to fight back.

They did it with determination, they did it with skill and they did it with a Grade 11 quarterback in Cam Bedore.

Not only did Bedore make his leadership felt in a championship game, hitting receivers like Desmond Bassi and John Watson while distributing the ball to his big gun Allan Dicks, but he did it on live television, in front of hundreds of loud fans and he did it into and with a viciously cold late-autumn wind that would make things interesting for professional pivots.

Centennial deserves all the credit for the win.

They were the better team.

But there is something to be said for the courage the Hawks showed by not folding their tent and feeling sorry for themselves when most people would’ve deemed that acceptable given the chilling circumstances the fact they are still kids.

Yet, that didn’t happen.

“We didn’t come out to play in the first quarter but we came back in the second half and unfortunately it didn’t turn out in our favour,” Hawks running back Allan Dicks told the Abbotsford-Mission Times after the game.

“We never quit. We probably have one of the tightest teams in all of B.C. high school football and we love each other and we were going to fight right to the end.”

In the end, the best team won.

And no one should take anything away from them or the Mouat Hawks.

In fact, those that saw the game live from the warm confines of the press box or from the chilly grand stands or on television should take a moment and think ‘that is what high school football is all about.’