Chiefs finish off the season with win

John Zsiray

Leader Staff

RONAN— The Chiefs just needed one win to help get the motivation flowing to take on any opponent as they turned out a win against Eureka last Friday night.

"It was really good to see my senior kids do well," head coach Jamie Courville said. "I was glad to see them win the last two games."

Coming off their first win of the season over Bigfork on Oct. 13, the Chiefs were ready to finish out the season on their own turf and their own terms sending their 11 seniors off with a win. The Chiefs were able to record 306 yards on the night, they came out fighting and battled through the game coming out with a 34-24 win over the first-year Northwestern A Lions.

"We got some things rolling against Eureka that we haven't been able to get rolling since the first couple of games," Courville said.

In the past two games the Chiefs offense has started to get the ball moving a lot better and have been reading the field and their blocks much better, Courville noted. The Chiefs in their last two games recorded 628 yards of rushing bringing them to a season total of 1,638 on the year.

"The biggest thing is staying healthy. That is the name of the game in football," Courville said. "Also getting a win early would have helped us confidence-wise a lot. The confidence level was low much of the time when we were 0-8 last year and 2-6 the year before so to have one win it just brought us back up."

Senior runningback Tylar Espinosa marched down the field for 175 yards on 23 carries for three touchdowns against the Lions helping to lead the Chiefs to victory. Espinosa recorded 873 yards with 132 carries for nine touchdowns, and he averaged 6.61 yards per carry on the season. These past two wins were the first for Espinosa as a Chief, as he transferred to Ronan as a junior before the 2005 season.

"The last two games were amazing. It was really nice to have gotten my first two wins as a Chief," Espinosa said. "It was pretty nice to win out as a senior. We carried over the fire from the Bigfork game and that helped us win. Honestly if we would have won the Browning game our season would have been a lot different."

Nick Courville was able to bring in 54 yards on 15 carries and picked up one TD on the night. During the season Courville brought in 444 yards on 84 carries recording three touchdowns.

"Nick ran really hard throughout the year and he started working on a lot of things and progressively got better," Courville said. "He started to do really well at the end of the year and finished on a high note."

Mike Fisher recorded 77 yards on seven carries for one touchdown on the night and his first TD of the season. He also threw two completions on 11 attempts for 27 yards. Throughout the season Fisher recorded 189 yards on 33 carries along with 26 completions on 71 attempts for 362 yards.

"Mike pulls through for us a lot," Courville said. "He came in and did a good job taking over as quarterback since the third game of the season."

During the last two games the Chiefs have been able to hold their own on the defensive line. The defense in the last game recorded two QB sacs coming from Logan Lloyd and Espinosa, for a team total of nine on the year.

"During the last two games and even during the Polson game our pad level has been really good," Courville said. "They put everything together really well in the last two games. I was very pleased. It needed to be that way a while ago."

Chief Woodrow Wayman, also a senior, was able to record five solo takedowns with five assists against Eureka. On the season Wayman was able to takedown 24 on his own helping out with 34 tackles for 58 on the year and he had one QB sac and one fumble recovery.

"Woody filled the holes extremely well, not just in this game but throughout the entire season," Courville said. "He always plays hard and was consistent on the season in motivating the younger kids."

Against the Lions senior Logan Lloyd was able to record four solo tackles with three assists, and he was able to recover three fumbles on the night as well. On the season he was able to bring in 15 tackles on his own helping out with 25 for 40 takedowns on the year and he had one QB sac and three fumble recoveries each coming in the last game.

" I wish there were more wins but that is the way to end the season," senior Logan Lloyd said. "I've been here all four years and that is the way to end it."

The Chiefs end the season with a 2-6 record in regular season play and 2-4 in conference play.

Ronan football will be losing 11 players to graduation. Those seniors that will be graduating are Cory Fife, Alan Skogen, Conrad Schweizerhoz, Mike Wolf, Seth Clary, Tylar Espinosa, Kris Lawson, Mike Bourdon, Logan Lloyd, Mike Trosper, and Woodrow Wayman.