McCallion
Quest

HMC Girls Flag Football Team Places 3^rd in Tournament!!!! 

Grade seven student, Shanell McLean intercepts for the winning touchdown in the Bronze Medal Game!

New Coaches, New Players…New Beginning…Happy Ending.

By: Melissa Jung, Editor

The new coaches for the 2005 Hazel McCallion Sr. P.S Girls Flag Football team, Mr. Robinson and Ms. Currie, had their initial hopes lowered when only five athletes showed up for the first girls football tryouts. Fortunately, more became interested, but limited amount of weeks remained until the football tournament, which were the only matches the team would play this year. At John Fraser Secondary School, the girls would be competing with several other Region of Peel middle schools. Most of the girls who came out to the tryouts had never played the game of football before, and a few of them never even knew the rules! Fortunately, a team was eventually chosen and football practices were underway.

The few remaining weeks flew by, and soon the day of the tournament was upon them. The players were excited and anxious, but also nervous. Even though he team had practiced 2-3 times a week, and had scrimmaged against each other, they had not even played a single exhibition game. Now, they only had one day, one chance to show how hard they had practiced and worked together, to deserve a ribbon.

With a queasy feeling in their stomachs caused by nervous anxiety, Mr. Robinson and Ms. Currie sat them down early in the morning of the tournament day, and talked to them. This pre game talk inspired the girls and they felt confident as they walked out of their school, the “home” they were to represent that day: Hazel McCallion Senior Public School.

As they arrived at John Fraser Secondary School, they kept their heads held up high and continued to encourage one another. Placed in a round robin group that consisted of  Edenwood Middle School, Dolphin Sr. Public School and Erin Mills Middle School, the Hazel girls needed to finish in the top two places to advance to the playoffs.

Their first game, against Edenwood, a ‘real’ game, finally gave them the opportunity to show what they had accomplished in their weeks of practice. Their hard work paid off. Alexis Blair, one of the team’s fastest players, pumped up the team with her touchdowns and enthusiastic dances after each successful play. On defence, Jamie Richards was leading by example, snapping the hard-to-grab flags from the opponents belts, to stop them in their tracks. The team, not only survived the anxiousness of their first game but they ended up beating Edenwood by several touchdowns.

In the second game of the day, the team had a tighter match versus Dolphin. The teams exchanged touchdowns and were tied at the half. Play went back and forth throughout the game, and there were a couple of touchdowns from both teams which were called back due to penalties or as Mr. Robinson called them, ‘mistakes by the officiating’. After one of these calls against Hazel, Alexis ran for a touchdown and the entire team jumped for joy, thinking it was the winning touchdown.  Unfortunately, the scorekeepers informed the referees that it was still not enough, because they had marked down the score as 3 touchdowns to 2, in favour of Dolphin.

The team took a break inside the school, and some of the girls had their heads down.  They felt as if they had won the last game, but it turned out to be the opposite. Coach Robinson asked the offensive and defensive captains to speak to their squads to keep them encouraged for the next and final round robin game.  They knew they had to win it to ensure a 2^nd place finish in their group and to advance to the playoffs.  At this time, Mr. Robinson also took aside the offense and showed them a new play to use for the next game, a double hand-off, or “reverse” play.

In the third game against Erin Mills, the team continued to play with inspiration.  Right from the first play, the new play that Mr. Robinson had drawn up for the offense was already being executed effectively between quarterback Melissa Jung and runners Taleen Noble and Meghan Doherty.  The defense also played well and were able to keep the opposition contained, and rarely allowed them onto the Hazel end of the field. The offense cleaned up after the great defensive plays and they beat Erin Mills. With 2^nd place in their pool, they headed into the playoffs, against Ruth Thomson, in what would turn out to be the most important game of the day, fighting for 3^rd place overall.

The girls from Ruth Thompson looked confident and aggressive leaving many of the HMC players intimidated. The offense was struggling with the football, since they had been forced into making short plays: runs, reverses and shovel passes.  Throughout the day there was a strong wind blowing, and especially during this game, the long passes would not work. The Ruth Thompson coach had noticed this and told her defensive team which players to look out for on the HMC team and to close them down. They had done this very well and Hazel had ran out of downs several times.

As the game neared its completion, they had one more down to cross the halfway mark of the field or else they would lose possession. Tianna Smart took the next hand-off, turned on her engines and in an electrifying run, rambled past the defenders and down the sideline, past the halfway mark and more, giving the team 3 more downs to get into the end zone.

At this stage of the game, Ruth Thompson were winning by a touchdown and time was winding down. A couple of more running plays advanced the scrimmage line closer to the end zone, but they were still 15 yards away. They needed a touchdown to tie the game. The team huddled, talked about it, and decided on a shovel pass play to the right side. However, it became apparent that the primary play was not to work so Melissa had to think fast. She turned the other way and saw Meghan running down the left side towards the endzone, and away from her defender. Throughout the game, the pass was not a good option due to the wind, but there was no other choice. The ball was thrown and Melissa immediately knew that it was going to be a bit short. Without giving up, Meghan came back to the ball, and used her soft hands to make the catch, the football inches away from hitting the ground.  She turned towards the endzone and was tackled on the way in for a touchdown! The game was tied.

The team and especially the defense, knew that there was less than 5 minutes left. Things were looking dangerous, with Ruth Thompson deep in Hazel’s half.  They were pushing for the lead, and decided to throw the ball. It was a long, high pass, but HMC defender, Shanell McLean, one of the two grade 7 students on the team, stepped up and intercepted the ball. It was a huge play that seemed to shock all players on the field, but without hesitation, Shanell squeezed it away from the group of players, and ran from deep in our half of the field, all the way into the endzone for a touchdown! Hazel took the lead! The clock eventually wound down, and finally, the whistle blew and the Hazel McCallion Girls Flag Football team were victorious in the 3^rd place game!

It was disappointing that there wasn’t enough time in the day to have a final game against the winner of the other group, but nonetheless, the HMC team finished a very respectable 3^rd place. Alexis had said, “We all worked together but, the defense was amazing in the game against Ruth Thompson. Shanell’s interception won the game for us.”

This group, from the beginning, even when they thought they wouldn’t have a team at all, came out and showed that they were more than what they appeared to be, with the proof being that they took home a 3^rd place ribbon. “We worked really hard, from not knowing how to play the game of football to actually getting 3^rd place in the South Peel tournament”, proudly exclaimed Mei Yi Pan. This team included on offense: Runners: Alexis Blair, Meghan Doherty, Taleen Noble, Tianna Smart, Centre/Snapper: Jane Sri, and Quarterback: Melissa Jung; on defence: Jamie Richards, Allie Fotopoulos, Christine Jang, Akeyla Liverpool-Jones, Shanell McLean, Kirsten Morrison and Mei Yi Pan. 

The team would like to thank Mr. Robinson and Ms. Currie for their time and effort to take this team on an adventure and through this great experience. They had done a great job in teaching the confusing rules of Flag Football. And as Mr. Robinson said repeatedly throughout the tournament and afterwards, the most important thing was that “The girls had FUN!” That, they did.