Rams use ground game to beat Catholic Central

By Lethbridge Herald on September 29, 2022.

Herald photo by JUSTIN SEWARD LCI Rams quarterback Marcus Christos tries to find a hole to run through on the line against the Catholic Central Cougars during first-half play of Southern Alberta High School Football League action at Community Stadium in this 2022 file photo. Christos will be expected to lead the team this weekend.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald

The LCI Rams football team saw five different players hit the endzone  in a 35-0 rout of the Catholic Central Cougars on a rainy Thursday night at Community Stadium.

The Rams wanted to go to the air more but the natural elements of the rain forced the green and gold to go to their ground game more.

“Honestly, I think when it starts to rain like that, the game plan kind of changes,” said Patrick Leahy, Ram head coach.

“We were hoping to come out today and throw the ball around a little bit and we did have some guys make catches and I thought we threw a couple of good balls but obviously the elements are against you. The ball starts to get a little bit heavy and the gloves don’t quite work as like they’re designed to.”

The Rams were able to adjust their strategy coming out of half time.

“I was happy with the way we came out of half time and kind of mixed things up and got behind the offensive line,” he said.

Leahy said the ball was at least a half a pound heavier than it was at the beginning of the game.

“So it’s tough for receivers when it gets like that, gloves don’t work  hardly at all when they get wet,” he said.

“You can keep trying but at a certain point you bang your head against the wall and you’re better off going to Plan B, which was getting behind the offensive line and run the ball a little bit on the ground.”

Leahy thought the defense rebounded nicely after getting shut out 50-0 by Raymond last week.

“I thought they came out and played physical … (and) we were sound in coverage,” he said.

Leahy thinks the offence is still a work in progress.

“We had five rushing touchdowns tonight which is a really good number for us,” said Leahy.

Payton Lyon led the way with two touchdowns while Alejandro Ogunyemi, quarterback Marcus Christos and Nate Morris all had a touchdown each.

“So kind of a balanced attack for us  on offence, he said.

“Again we want to throw the ball a bit more than we did (but) nature had its own plans … But aside from that I was happy with the way we kind of executed. But by no means are we a finished product; we’ve got a ton of work to do. So we’ll use this for a learning opportunity for growth.”