Depending on which side of the ball the Bellerose Bulldogs lined up on, the glass was half full or half empty over the 40-point loss to the Harry Ainlay Titans.

“We competed fairly well with a high level team like that,” said Grade 11 quarterback Tristan Olenick of the 49-9 result in the division one Carr conference opener in metro Edmonton high school football last Friday at Foote Field.

“We left quite a bit on the field though. On offence we could've played a little bit better. Defence, too. Otherwise overall it was a good game.”

Evan Moroz, a Grade 12 cornerback, had a different take on the outcome against the Carr champions the last two years and 2018 Alberta Bowl Tier I (1,250-plus students) finalists.

“It was a disappointing performance from everyone on the team,” Moroz said. “We really wanted to improve on last year’s performance and we really thought we had a really good chance to beat them this year.”

When asked if it was moral victory after last year’s 77-0 shellacking by Ainlay in week two of the regular season, Moroz replied: “A loss is a loss. We’re only happy with winning.”

Stats from the game were not posted on the Bellerose football web page at press time.

Head coach Jason Lafferty estimated the halftime score was 28-1 and Adam Rafat was on the receiving end of a catch and run touchdown pass from Olenick in the second half.

As for the defensive unit, “Everything that we messed up on against Harry Ainlay we know what we did wrong and we can improve on that and we have guys with heart so they’re strong and they know how to improve and play better,” Moroz said.

Prior to the Ainlay match, the Bulldogs huddled up in two exhibitions: 30-12 loss to the LCI Rams of Lethbridge and 25-21 win against the Notre Dame Cougars of Red Deer.

Last year's Bulldogs finished 3-4 overall as the sixth and last playoff qualifier in the Carr after losing their first three games.

This year’s eight-team Carr conference features three of the top-10 Tier I teams in the Football Alberta rankings: No. 2 Salisbury Sabres (1-0), No. 6 Ainlay and the No. 9 Spruce Grove Panthers (1-0).

Friday the Bulldogs hosted the Ross Sheppard Thunderbirds (1-0) at Larry Olexiuk Field and the score was unavailable at press time.

“We’re going in pretty confident. That’s a winnable game for us,” Olenick said at Thursday’s practice.

“We want it to not be a close game. We want to blow them out, but we’ll just have to see if it happens on Friday,” added Moroz, 17.

The next game is Friday versus the visiting Bev Facey Falcons (0-1) at 7:30 p.m.

Olenick, 15, has faith in the Bulldogs’ ability to put points on the board.

“Offensively we’re pretty strong,” he said. “Some of our strengths are the passing game.

“The big thing is protection. You can’t do anything without protection from the O-line.”

Olenick drew the start at QB against Ainlay after spending last year with the junior Bulldogs as the team’s MVP.

“It gave me lots of leadership leading into this year,” Olenick said of his first season of high school football. “It helped getting a feel for the game and the speed of it and making decisions on the fly.”

Taking the next step to the senior level has been somewhat of a smooth transition for Olenick.

“I’ve played football with lots of these guys throughout SAMFA (St. Albert Minor Football Association) so that chemistry obviously has carried over and that’s nice to see.”

Junior Bulldogs

The first game for the junior Bulldogs is Wednesday against Shep at 7:30 p.m. at Larry Olexiuk Field.

At a recent jamboree, the Bulldogs posted victories of 21-14 against Ainlay, 14-0 against Shep and 21-7 against Facey.

Spotted at Thursday’s practice was Tim Enger, the longtime Football Alberta executive director who is assisting his son Mackenzie, the new head coach of the junior Bulldogs.

The Bulldogs are the third St. Albert team Enger has been associated with as a coach after the early years of the St. Albert High Skyhawks and most recently the Paul Kane Blues.

The Bellerose Bulldogs ride the wave of momentum into the playoffs as winners of three in a row.

The opening-round clincher was 41-7 over the Jasper Place Rebels on Friday as Bellerose finished 3-3 for sixth place in the division one Carr conference.

“We’re really excited we made the playoffs after we started the season off a little rough,“ said Bronson Wilke, a Grade 12 middle linebacker who led the defensive charge with 10 tackles against the Rebels (0-6).

“We were fed up with what was happening,” said Wilke of Bellerose losing three straight. “We know we have potential to do a lot better than this and we can because we have an amazing group of guys so we turned up the volume on our plays and our practices. We amped it up.”

Bellerose (103 PF/177 PA) and the third-place Austin O’Brien Crusaders (4-2, 201 PF/145 PA) butt heads for the first time this season in Friday’s 5 p.m. playoff at Foote Field.

The winner advances to the Nov. 2 semifinal against the second-place Salisbury Sabres (5-1, 293 PF/47 PA) and the final is Nov. 9 at Commonwealth Stadium.

Bellerose didn’t huddle up against the AOB or Salisbury in league play because of this year’s rotating Carr schedule.

“They’re a pretty strong team and they’re definitely going to be competition for us,” said Wilke of AOB, the fifth-ranked Tier II (750 to 1,249 students) team in the province. “But we’ve really moulded as a team over the last few games we played and we finally came tighter as a defence and offence. We work together now and we trust each other. We’ve bonded more so we’re better as a team now going against AOB.

“We’re really excited for this game,” added Wilke, 17, a Morinville Community High School student.

Nothing beats winning to pull everybody together.

“We’ve got addicted to this team feeling of togetherness,” Wilke said. “We’re like, OK, we’re going to go out with flying fists and we’re going to play with all of our hearts.”

Credit the Jason Lafferty-coached Bellerose lineup for not throwing in the towel after losses of 31-9 against the Ross Sheppard Thunderbirds (4-2), 77-0 against the Harry Ainlay Titans (6-0), last year’s Carr and Alberta Bowl Tier I (1,250-plus students) champions, and 31-2 against the Spruce Grove Panthers (3-3).

“It was more like a kick in the ass than something to complain about because we knew we were a lot better than we reflected the way we were playing,” Wilke said. “It was just amazing how we became a team through the losses. We didn’t go home and go all sad. We saw what we did wrong and we said we have to fix this and this and this so we can beat our next opponent.”

Bellerose rose to the challenge with victories of 14-8 against the Bev Facey Falcons (0-6) and 37-23 against the Strathcona Lords (2-4) in setting the stage for a winning performance against the Rebels on Senior Night at Larry Olexiuk Field.

Mohammad Zeidan’s field goals of 35 and 24 yards, plus five conversions, Adam Rafat’s 51-yard catch and dash touchdown reception from Jared Koziol and four rushing TDs by Brett Yost of 25, three, six and two yards put points on the board as Bellerose led17-0 at halftime.

Yost gained 250 yards overall on 22 carries.

Koziol, who suffered an upper-body injury in the contest, was 9-for-15 passing for 231 yards and one interception. His backup, Jayden Randall, completed one of two passes for four yards and also gained 17 yards on three runs.

Rafat led all receivers with five receptions for 118 yards.

Pablo Rizzi-Benavides also picked off one pass.

The Bellerose Bulldogs are a year older and wiser with Jason Lafferty as the head instructor.

The first season with Lafferty at the controls ended with three wins in seven games in the division one Carr conference of the metro Edmonton league.

“We’re one year removed from some of those games and we learned a lot,” said Lafferty, the 2018 Metro Athletics Coach of the Year in the Carr. “I made a lot of mistakes last year and I had a lot of self reflection on how I can be better and how that can help the kids.

“I’m just looking forward to having another year with some of these guys.”

The Bulldogs got off to a rocky start with three losses by a combined score of 139-11 before willing their way back into contention with three victories for a playoff berth that led to the 49-14 loss to the Austin O’Brien Crusaders.

“It sucked we got bounced out in the first round playoffs, but overall it was a decent season and it led well into this season,” said Adam Rafat, a Grade 12 slotback.

The template of expectations is in place for Year 2 of the Lafferty era.

“We’re one year into the culture we’re trying to build,” said the Bellerose Composite High School teacher. “The big thing is that they know me and the standards of the program that we’re trying to set. They understand the expectations of myself (and the coaching staff) and they understand what’s expected of them. Last year it was new territory for them.

“Schematically we’ll be better for having that year of just our own systems, but bigger than that is the coaching staff that we’ve put together and their stamp on the program. That’s where we're going to see the difference and that’s the total buy-in from the starter number one person on our program from an ability standpoint right down to the 35th person.”

The turnover cycle of players gives Lafferty reasons to be optimistic.

“I'm already looking at these young Grade 10s we have coming in and there’s some big bodies there that I'm really excited to see how they grow,” Lafferty said. “I’m excited to see how the Grade 10s who came in last year grow like Zach Martyniuk and Caleb Akerley, those kind of guys that played on the senior team last year. They're gifted kids who I'm excited to see where they go.

“At the same time I’m excited to see the Grade 12s and see how they lead this thing."

Lafferty promised no anchors will hold the Bulldogs back and the glass will be half full of players who can do it instead of half empty of those players who can't.

“I told them (Tuesday) it’s not my program. I can’t be the only one caring about this. They have to be able to care about it and show that they are wanting to be here and invest and sacrifice and all those kind of things," said the 2018 U18 Team Alberta assistant coach. "That’s what makes our game great. It's that sacrifice and doing it for the guy beside you."

Rafat is confident the Bulldogs will improve on last year’s performance.

“We have a pretty strong team. We can definitely be a top three team, we just need everyone to show up and put the work in,” said the co-captain.

Jayden Randall, a returnee, and Tristan Olenick, last year’s MVP of the junior Bulldogs, will vie for the starting quarterback position and their main offensive weapons include Jordan Howe and Rafat.

“Our offence is going to be pretty strong. We had two or three starting Grade 12s on our offence last year and the rest were a bunch of Grade 10s and 11s,” said Rafat, the team leader with 23 receptions and 358 receiving yards while scoring two touchdowns. He also also averaged 27.4 yards on 37 punts. “I want to keep making plays for my team and keep working hard and make sure everyone is focused.”

There are no soft opponents in the Carr for the Bulldogs to beat up with the Harry Ainlay Titans, the defending league champions and Alberta Bowl Tier I (school population 1,250-plus) finalists, second-place Salisbury Sabres and Austin O’Brien among the heavy hitters in the eight-team conference.

“It’s not an easy division for sure because there are a lot of tough teams like Ainlay and Sal, those are probably going to be the hardest teams we're going to play this year, but I'm looking forward to the competition. It’s always fun to play high competition level football,” said Rafat, 17, a junior Bulldog in Grade 10.

The Bulldogs face a stiff test in the Sept. 6 league opener against Ainlay at 5 p.m. at Foote Field. Last year in week two Ainlay muzzled the Bulldogs 77-0.

“We’re going into the belly of the beast,” said Lafferty, noting it's up to the Bulldogs to prove they belong with the best. “We just have to battle and have fun doing it. We showed a bit of that in the spring where we were really pleased with the kids' ability to be mentally tough when they were faced with adversity and they don’t back down.”

Lafferty certainly embraced the challenge of replacing Chad Hill, the longtime head coach (2008 to 2017 for the seniors and 2005 to 2014 for the juniors) and Bellerose teacher, and was rewarded with coach of the year honours. Hill, the Carr coach of the year in 2016 and 2017, joined the Sturgeon Spirits to coach the school’s first football team and was followed by basically the entire coaching staff from the 2017 Bellerose team that finished 7-4 while competing in its first Carr final, recorded its first Tier I provincial playdown win and reached the Tier I north final for the first time in team history.

“I really feel that’s a program award,” Lafferty said. “It’s a feather in the school’s cap because Chad won it a few times and it speaks volumes to the administration, the athletic director, the kids and the coaching staff here especially last year and the guys I surround myself with. They are men of integrity, men who want to teach and men who want to grow young men.

“I’m certainly humbled by the nomination and receiving the award.”

THIRD DOWN: Today at 1:45 p.m. the Bulldogs host the LCI Rams of Lethbridge in an exhibition/jamboree style format at Larry Olexiuk Field.

Friday the Bulldogs huddle up against the visiting Notre Dame Pride of Red Deer, the Tier Isouth finalists, at 6 p.m.

The first league game at home is Sept. 13 against the Ross Sheppard Thunderbirds at 7:30 p.m.

A pair of females were among the Bulldogs at training camp this week competing for playing time on the junior and senior teams.

Mackenzie Enger, the 2018 Football Alberta Novice Coach of the Year Award recipient with the St. Alberta Minor Football Association, is the new head coach of the junior Bulldogs, the only high school junior team in St. Albert. The Paul Kane Blues two years ago and the St. Albert High Skyhawks in 2014 ceased operations of their junior teams due to a lack of players for both programs to field junior and senior teams.

The first game for the junior Bulldogs is Sept. 18 against Ross Sheppard at 7:30 p.m. at Larry Olexiuk Field.