Thunder’s 40-21 victory prevents a PFC road trip to Calgary

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The Regina Thunder had so much fun playing their Prairie Football Conference game against the Calgary Colts, they want to do it again.

Same place. Same time. Same opponents, with the home team hoping the upcoming league semifinal at Leibel Field resembles the regular-season finale — which the Thunder won 40-21 on Sunday — minus the big plays. If the Colts had won the contest, they would have hosted the Thunder in their PFC semifinal. So the victory saved the Thunder a bus trip.

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“They’re an explosive team,” said Thunder defensive back Adam King, who had one of Regina’s four interceptions. “Three big plays essentially gave them their 21 points.

“They’ve got a lot of athletes. We’ve got to shut down those plays, defensively at least, and we’ll be alright.”

Regina’s two-pronged running attack scored all of its touchdowns, with speedy Sadik Sadik scoring three times and powerful, record-setting Ryland Leichert getting the other. With three safety touches plus Shawn Green’s four converts and two field goals, the Thunder offset long Colts majors by Antoine Barrett on an 82-yard punt return, Quinn Fedoroff on a 39-yard pass from Isaiah Klein and Jabreel Yahaya on a 51-yard running play.

Regina’s victory improved its record to its record to 6-2, earning home-field advantage for the second-place Thunder. With a 4-4 record, third-place Calgary gets a return bus trip for the playoff game.

Kickoff for Sunday’s semifinal game is 1 p.m. at Leibel Field. The other semifinal features the fourth-place Edmonton Huskies visiting the undefeated, first-place Saskatoon Hilltops, the reigning Canadian junior football champions.

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The Colts stayed in contention until late in the third quarter when they fumbled a punt return deep in their end. Two plays later Sadik’s second major put Regina ahead 33-21.

“They hit hard and they’re fast,” said Sadik. “We know our offence and defence, we’re gonna find a scheme that’s going to help us get the edge on them.

“They didn’t give up, 100 per cent. But hey, at the end of the day, neither did we.”

Playing without starting quarterback Carter Moberg, Ethan Hugg took most of the snaps for Regina before being replaced for a few plays by Adam Mosher. Thunder head coach Scott MacAulay said he wanted to try “some different guys” at quarterback and also in the offensive backfield, where Leichert set a team record this season with 3,388 rushing yards.

“We want to try using that (two-back offence) as much as we can, but we’ve got four or five running backs that we gotta try and use,” said MacAulay.

“It’s extremely hard to play a team back-to-back, so you try to save something for the next game. Everyone was trying to check each other out, but we’ve got a few things up our sleeve.”

In a six-team league with an unbalanced, eight-game schedule, Calgary met Regina only once during the regular season.

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“I kind of like knowing our opponents, knowing who you’re going against, getting a better feel for stuff so we can prepare for that second battle,” said King. “They’re pretty tough. They’ve got a couple good running backs and a couple good receivers. They’ve got talent.”

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