September 9th, 20222. Langford, BC (ISN) – It was “Friday Night Under The Lights” at Goudy Field in Langford as the Varsity Football Mt Douglas Rams went head-to-head with the visiting John Barsby Bulldogs of Nanaimo in BC High School exhibition football action where the Rams would gut out a 28-20 win, much on the legs of senior Malik Gagne-Smith’s three touchdown performance.
The Rams, looking for a good, new first step after the loss of a few key player graduates last year, would get all they could handle against the Bulldogs Friday night.
The Bulldogs, looking sharp in their first offensive series with the ball, would open the game’s scoring 6-0. The Rams would not take long to reply. In what was a back-and-forth affair all game, the Rams QB Tristan Fletcher would lead his team down field to post their own major and go up 7-6.
The Rams would find themselves behind once again in the second half before Fletcher would throw a strike in the back of the endzone to Gagne-Smith in the dying seconds of the half to go up 14-13.
The Rams would come out of halftime, looking more physical on defense versus the Bulldogs. Gagne-Smith would play as Fletcher’s go to ball carrier once again, carrying the ball on successive plays down field fifty yards, and to the house for his second major of the game, putting his team up 21-13.
Barsby Bulldogs, not bending down to Rams pressure, would prove resilient in backing of the Rams defense, to find the house to pull to within a point of tying the game in late in the third quarter, 21-20.
After Gagne-Smith’s third TD of the game at the seven-minute mark of the fourth quarter would give his team a 28-20 lead a favourable cushion to work with, the Bulldogs would go back to work, swaying momentum once again back in their favour. Backing up the Rams defense half of the field, to the Rams 45 yrd line with three minutes to play, the Bulldogs appeared poised to reply until Rams safety Ben Attwell would step in front on an errant Bulldogs-thrown ball at his twenty-five-yard line for the pick to deflate the Bulldogs hopes.
The Rams would hold onto the ball and the lead to come away with a hard-fought 28-20 victory.
