In their previous game, the Ballenas Whalers senior football squad unleashed a record-breaking offensive performance.
In the opening round of the B.C. AA Football playoffs, the Whalers dialed up the defence.
Turning the tide with a safety early in the second half, Ballenas charged back from a halftime deficit to claim a 16-6 win over Holy Cross that moved the team into this weekend’s quarterfinals against Interior Conference champion Vernon.
“I’m a big believer that defence wins championships, and our defence played very, very well (Saturday),” Whalers coach Dan Smith said after the victory in Abbotsford. “We had a good defensive game plan going in, and the kids executed well.”
Dayton Coles rushed eight yards for a third-quarter score that gave the Whalers the lead for good at 9-6. After another drive to the Crusaders’ one-yard line ended with a lost fumble, Ballenas stopped Holy Cross
(6-4) to get the ball back and eventually put the game away on a late three-yard touchdown run by quarterback Ben Robinson.
Ballenas was coming off a 68-42 win two weeks earlier over Western AA Conference champion Hugh Boyd. But the coach does not anticipate any 110-point games in the Whalers’ future as they take aim at a date in the Dec. 3 provincial championship game.
“Everything tightens up in championship games, and this was more like a championship game,” Smith said of Saturday’s first-round win. “It was a playoff-type game.”
The Whalers struggled out of the gate, hurting themselves with penalties that sustained Holy Cross drives and struggling to move the ball against the stout Crusaders’ defence, Smith said.
A long pass to all-purpose weapon Marcus Browne set up a short touchdown plunge that gave the Surrey squad, the runners-up in the Eastern AA Conference, a 6-0 lead in the second quarter. But that would be all Ballenas would allow.
“In the second half we basically shut them down,” Smith said. “We eliminated the penalties and the long pass plays.”
Ballenas Whalers defenders including Austen Hunt, left, Connor Knutson (23) and Joshua Rice, right, gang-tackle Frank Hurt ballcarrier Marco Lucarino during their game at Ballenas in late October. — Image credit: J.R. Rardon/PQB NEWS
That defence set up the first Whalers score early in the third period, after they pinned Holy Cross deep in its own end of the field and forced a punt from the end zone.
When the centre snap flew over the punter’s head and out of the end zone, it gave Ballenas its first two points and the ball back.
Linebacker Austen Hunt had a team-leading seven tackles, and Callum Jasinski added five tackles and a pass interception.
Once Ballenas was on the scoreboard, the offence went to work.
Stymied by Holy Cross on the outside rushing and rollout option passing attack that proved so effective against Hugh Boyd, the Whalers ground out yardage between the tackles.
Tailbacks Coles and Logan Pepper, fullback Austen Hunt and Robinson all found success as the Ballenas line began to take control and the Whalers chewed large chunks of time off the clock while keeping the ball out of the hands of Browne and the Crusaders.
Coles battled for 66 yards on 19 carries. Robinson finished with 72 yards on 15 carries on the ground, and completed six of 17 passes for 87 yards.
Robinson found both Callum Jasinski and Liviano Canil with key third-down pass completions to keep drives alive, but Smith said the passing game was more “timely” than consistent as a weapon.
“We didn’t throw particularly great, but came up with some key passing plays at points, when we needed them,” Smith said. “It was more about ball control, about pounding it out and keeping control of the ball.”
The date and time of this weekend’s quarterfinals has not yet been announced. The Whalers will travel to face Vernon, which drew a bye in the playoffs’ opening week as the top seed from the Interior.
