It’s a clean slate for a Spartans team looking to make a return date.
The defending Tier II provincial champion Strathcona-Tweedsmuir Spartans will need new faces to do the heavy lifting if they want to get back on top of the province with 11 key cogs lost to graduation in the off-season and the team 1-1 through two Big Sky Rugby contests.
“It’s almost a blessing in disguise to lose your first one,” said Spartans head coach Christopher Ruskay. “We were undefeated last year, but that’s ancient history now.
“This is a different team, a new season, new dawn and we will try to piece together what we can with who we have and try to get to Lethbridge.”
The Spartans dropped their season opener to the Foothills Falcons earlier this month on the last play of the game yet managed to give the much larger school a pretty good run for their money.
It doubled as an opportunity to get the newcomers on the field from the get-go.
“The first thing is getting over the nerves of actually going into the game. We had three or four guys who’ve never started before,” Ruskay said. “They were really nervous, jittery and you kind of get into a zone and realize it’s not as bad as I thought.
“It’s just accumulating minutes, like every other sport. The game slows down and you can manage what’s going on.”
Key veterans like fourth-year back and captain Ethan Dokter become even more vital with the age demographics and lack of experience in what is a transitional year for the squad.
“With high school sports you’ve got to have that glue that binds the whole thing together,” Ruskay said. “The guys have been in these scenarios, they know our schemes, they know our terminology and are comfortable with our game.
“And they’re good athletes. Ethan Dokter is a great athlete, Carter Sten, Sean Michael-Taylor is another one. Not only playing great, they’re leading.”
STS got contributions across the board from rookies and veterans alike in a comprehensive 44-12 home-pitch triumph over the Highwood Mustangs on April 20.
Sten, Dokter, Michael-Taylor, Jack Dexter, Spencer McMaster and Alex Boulliane all contributed trys for the well-rounded Spartans attack. Multi-sport athlete Nicolas Lush contributed two penalty kicks and five conversions.
“We had a lot of new guys. This lineup was completely different from last week,” Ruskay said. “That’s good to see we have some guys on the bench who can actually play this game.”
The Spartans forwards were particularly impressive, winning the battles on the front-line, getting first to the ball on the ruck and gaining serious yardage on the maul — a veritable scrum which is formed during open play — something of a Spartans rugby trademark.
“We were really well co-ordinated, we weren’t overreaching in terms of running with the ball,” said Ruskay. “Everybody settled in terms of positioning and tackling and were really like a machine, moving around as a group all in unison.”
The young Spartans are in for arguably their biggest test of the season when they next take to the pitch in an April 27 battle with the Tier I powerhouse Holy Trinity Academy Knights.
The Knights, provincial silver medallists a year ago, host the contest at 5 p.m.
