Smyth Helps Chatham-Kent Cougars Hunt Down the Thunderbirds
Graham Smyth carries for the Chatham-Kent Cougars
The Chatham-Kent Cougars Junior Varsity and Varsity teams were in action in Chatham this past Sunday. Graham Smyth, a Univeristy of Guelph Gryphons recruit for this coming year, lead the charge for the Varsity Chatham-Kent Cougars scoring 2 touchdowns on route to a 30-9 win for Chatham-Kent over the Forest City Thunderbirds.
Smyth’s touchdowns both sparked the Cougars, one coming off an interception where Smyth ran the ball back 25 yards for the score. Smyth’s other touchdown was a 65-yard punt return. Zach Welton, who went 5/11 for 41 yards in the passing game, scored for the Cougars on a 47 yard rush.
Clark Green went 2/3 on field goal attempts making a 37 yarder as his long on the day. Josh Shuian was solid defensively for the Cougars collecting 6 tackles, one QB sack, and a safety.
In the Junior Varsity game, the Cougars narrowly lost to London’s Forest City Thunderbirds 19-14. Quarterback Cole Herman threw for a total of 202 yards on 15 completions for the day and also had 2 special team tackles. 7 of those passes went to Ben Bartlett for 102 yds. Bartlett scored all of the Chatham-Kent Cougars’ points in the loss with 2 TD’s and kicked both converts for a total of 14 points. Jon Ashby, Max Fantuz and Markus Shadd caught the rest of Herman’s passes in the game.
Tanner Emery topped the Chatham-Kent Cougars stat sheets in rushing, putting down 89 hard earned yards on 16 carries. Zack Bedford also ran 52 yards on punt returns and had 2 tackles.
Prior to the game, the JV Cougars head coach posted this on the team’s Facebook page, “We are looking forward to building on the blocks we set in place last week. Offensively we are looking to establish our run game and capitalize on big plays. Defensively we need to improve consistency and cause turnovers.”
Although the Cougars couldn’t top the Thunderbirds on the scoreboard, several players did come up with big defensive plays. Anthony Cunha, who scored two late 4th quarter touchdowns Saturday to power the UCC Lancers to a Kent Championship in high school football, made his debut on defence with 7 tackles. Kameron Rylett-Ward and Erich Demars had 6 tackles each, while Josh Billingham and Zach Goetghebeur had 5, and Mitch Anderson had 1 tackle and recovered a fumble.
The next game for the Chatham-Kent Cougars Junior Varsity squad is Sunday, June 12th on the road facing the Burlington Stampeders.