Rams set to battle Falcons for Alberta Bowl berth

By Lethbridge Herald on November 16, 2023.

Herald Photo by Justin Seward LCI Rams quarterback Marcus Christos hands off to brother Michael during a drill at practice on Tuesday.

By Justin Seward

Lethbridge Herald
The LCI Rams football team  are one win away from being the south representatives for the Larry Wilson Tier I Division at the Alberta Bowl next weekend, but they know they have a tall task in front of them to get there with tomorrow’s semi-final against the Foothills Falcons.

The Rams will be looking to ride the high of their 38-7 quarter-final win last week  against Henry Wise Wood going in.

“Yeah, that was a good Tier I team win,” said Joey Cavilla, Rams offensive coordinator.  

“Like all season we’ve kind of been close and we’ve never gotten really over the hump. But to actually beat a good Tier 1 team soundly like we did gives the kids a lot of confidence going into a semi-final. That’s super important. So we’re going to try and move forward with everything. There’s still things that we have to improve but overall the confidence of the boys is much higher out here in November than maybe it would have been two weeks ago.”

The Rams are focused on taking away the Falcons’ weapons on the defensive side while executing on offence.

“They’ve got really good athletes on offence and for that reason we’ve been really focused at practice this week (on) how can we limit those guys,” said Cavilla.

“There’s a few guys  that we’re worried about and then offensively, the message (has)  just  been can we continue to execute, can we continue to kind of make little changes without wholesale changes that give us a slight edge against Foothills.”

Cavilla thinks the team will have to take care of the football on the offensive side, limit turnovers and on defence  take away big plays from their opponent if they want to see success.

LCI wants to clean up their tackling ahead of the semi-final.

“Like we still have to do a better job getting 12 guys to the football,” he said.

Another important component for the Green and Gold in preparation has been keeping the energy high at practice.

“(The) main thing at practice this week is just keeping the energy high,” said Cavilla.

“It’s been a long season, right, and the kids get tired and school’s getting long days and we come out in the cold. So our big coaching emphasis has just been keeping the boys ready to go and  you know what, they’ve kind of met the challenge there. They’re bringing the energy every night.”

“We’re very hyped,” said quarterback Marcus Christos.

“We’re ready. We’re running hard, no injuries, we’re staying healthy and we’re ready for the next one.”

Christos said Foothills is a strong hard hitting team.

“They won’t give up on us in any condition of weather,” said Christos.

“They love running the ball, they love passing the ball (and) a great team to play in the (semi-finals).”

Christos thinks of confidence if the Rams are to come out on top.

“When we play confident, we play really well, our speed is really good,” he said.

“Yeah we just need to stay confident and we’ll do great.”

Kick-off will be at 3 p.m. tomorrow  at Shouldice Park in Calgary.

The winner will play either the Paul Kane Blues or Salisbury Sabres in the Alberta Bowl championship on Nov. 25 in Red Deer.