History has been made on the gridiron. The Creighton Kodiaks opened their season with their first-ever victory over a southern team on the road last week, beating Shellbrook 36-34 in an instant classic.
The host Aardvarks almost came back to win in the final quarter, but Creighton held on to an early lead and earned just the program’s second-ever win over southern Saskatchewan opponents, coming after a victory over Rosthern last year.
“I think the football gods were smiling on us a little bit,” said Kodiaks head coach Ryan Karakochuk the day following the win.
The Kodiaks led Shellbrook at half and kept the pressure up, but Shellbrook staged a fourth-quarter comeback and snagged the lead. With half a quarter left to play, the Kodiaks were down 28-20.
“I thought early on, we had a chance to really distance ourselves from them. I thought we really dominated in the trenches early, all the way up until the late third quarter, then we started turning over the ball - which is something we can’t do. We let them take control of the game,” said Karakochuk.
In the final five minutes, the Kodiaks got down the field and scored a touchdown, then hit a two-point convert kick to tie the game - in six-man football, field goal kicks mean two extra points, not just one like in standard Canadian football.
In the final minutes, the Aardvarks had a drive of their own stopped by a Creighton interception, leading to a go-ahead touchdown for the Kodiaks with less than two minutes to go and nailing the convert. The Kodiaks then forced Shellbrook into what could have been a decisive third down stop, but a late flag gave Shellbrook a fresh set of downs and renewed hope.
With just seven seconds to go, the Aardvarks pushed through on a first and goal play to cross the plane, scoring a touchdown and putting the hosts one converted kick away from tying the game and forcing overtime.
“I think it might have clipped one of our kids’ fingers - it still had the power to go through, but it hit the post and went right. It went out,” said Karakochuk.
The last-second stop was the program’s first-ever win against Shellbrook. Creighton had played the team on three previous occasions, including twice last year - the Aardvarks won each game, including in a provincial playoff game three years ago.
The Kodiaks’ passing and run games both led to scores - running back Payton Pelletier found the endzone twice on the ground, while quarterback Josh Trumbley did the same once. Creighton also picked up two receiving touchdowns from Rogan Hlady and Matthew Lavis and Hlady kicked enough converts to force the victory.
“I think I can speak for all 30-some players - it was just a joy that it’s hard to explain,” said Karakochuk.
“It’s a win that I thought we deserved, but then I thought we were going to let it slip away. The resiliency of our team… it was a lot of emotion in one game, but we truly, truly needed it to give us the momentum to play a really good team coming up.”
The Kodiaks are now tied for first in the conference, sporting a 1-0 record. In the other game in the conference last week, the Wakaw Warriors defeated Hague 44-30. This week, the two 1-0 teams will face off at Creighton’s Oval of Dreams - the Kodiaks will host Wakaw Sept. 12, starting at 4 p.m., to see whose “0” must go.
The team will also be hosting a donation drive for the Flin Flon/Creighton and District SPCA at the game, calling for donations of money or pet supplies for the organization and its shelter.
Karakochuk said the team keeps a list of goals for the season in their locker room - the win knocked off several of those goals in one shot.
“The first goal was winning a road game - we’ve never won a road game in this conference and we’ve never beat the three teams in this conference. We also checked that box,” said the coach.
“It’s a big thing. Now, we have one of the biggest boxes that we need to check - that’s to beat Wakaw.”
Wakaw is a regional high school football juggernaut, having won several conference titles and even a provincial championship. In several previous meetings, including in provincial playoff games while Creighton still played in the northern Saskatchewan league, Wakaw has gone undefeated against the Kodiaks. In a home game against the Warriors last year, the Kodiaks were able to hang with Wakaw for much of the first half, leading at different points before the visitors pulled away in the second half.
“We know now that we can win - that goes a long way in any sport. The belief that you can win, the belief that you can play with teams that have beaten you for a lot of years… the way we did it, we had the lead, we lost the lead and the old Creighton Kodiaks, against southern teams, kind of just folded up,” Karakochuk said.
“We knew we were good, that we were the better team and it wasn’t over - we just needed somebody to make a play and Josh did that. He was able to move the chains, carry us down, tie the game and that gave the defence a spark once we tied it up. On the road, on their field, in their home opener, I think we learned a lot about ourselves and I hope we can carry that over to Wakaw.”
