The Okanagan Sun’s quest for a B.C. Football Conference title will have to wait another year.
Nathan Lund scored the decisive points on a six-yard run in game’s final minute to push the Langley Rams past the Sun 23-19 in the conference championship Sunday afternoon at the Apple Bowl.
Trailing 19-16 in the fourth quarter, the Rams appeared to have tied the game on a field goal by Steve Thomas, but a roughing the kicker penalty against the Sun kept the Langley drive alive, setting the stage for Lund’s major.
Sun head coach Shane Beatty said his team was out-coached and outplayed, and made a few too many mistakes. Still, the second year field boss didn’t question the effort of his players.
“We played our butts off, all those kids played hard,” said Beatty. “We take the lead, they take the lead…I mean that’s just two very good football teams. It was a very-well played football game except for the roughing penalty, a couple of missed field goals and an offside penalty that hurt us at the end.”
The Langley defence played the Sun tough all afternoon, holding them without a touchdown until early in the fourth quarter. The Sun’s only major came on an electrifying 101-yard run by Alex Bradley.
The Sun, who finished the regular season in top spot at 9-1, had beaten the Rams in two of three regular season meetings.
Rams head coach Jeff Alamolhoda said his club learned from those losses and came ready to play on Sunday.
“We decided that the difference-maker was going to be us and how we bonded together, how we played for each other, and we felt if we played that way we were going to win,” Alamolhoda said. “They believed in each other right until the last seconds on the clock.”
The Sun’s last BCFC title and Canadian Bowl appearance came in 2004.
The Rams will host the Saskatoon Hilltops in the Canadian Bowl on Saturday, Nov. 8.
