The Vanier Vikings are without question the class of the Moose Jaw High School Football League.
But that doesn’t mean ECS Elecs head coach Marco Ricci is giving his team a free pass for Saturday’s 46-0 loss to the Vikings in Moose Jaw.
“As bad as we played, they’re not 46 points better than us,” said Ricci, adding that it was “completely unacceptable to show this type of effort.”
Ricci said he didn’t want to make excuses for the Elecs (1-1), although he noticed after the first quarter that the 33-degree temperature was taking its toll on a shorthanded roster.
“We had four linemen who had to go both ways. We didn’t have enough guys,” he said. “The first quarter was even. We played with them. We played well. In the second quarter you could just see it was getting away from us.”
By the end of the half, the Vikings had built a 24-0 lead.
Ricci said the Elecs “didn’t even come close” to reaching the end zone, completing only a pair of short passes and struggling to establish the running game.
“We struggled very hard with execution on offence,” he said.
“We’re definitely not at their calibre right now. They’re an experienced team that has everyone back. They’re super talented, fast, and we let the game get away from us.”
The story wasn’t much better for a defence that spent most of the game on the field.
“We totally did not play well. We didn’t run to the ball, we didn’t tackle. Looking at it, it was not indicative of how we’ve been playing earlier in the season.”
The good news is the Elecs will get some players back from the injured list for Friday’s home opener against the A.E. Peacock Tornadoes. Game time is 4 p.m.
Ricci said the game is a chance for the Elecs to “redeem ourselves” in front of a home crowd.
“We need to come out and obviously be a little more focused,” he said.
“The other thing is the boys gotta realize you’re going to have games like this. Sometimes when games get crazy and out of hand, you gotta find a way to bring it back. We just couldn’t do that. We, as coaches, need to do a better job with that.”
