After a recent devastating beatdown by Victoria's Mt. Douglas, the varsity Hyacks seemed to have something to prove on Friday.
The Hyacks were back at home facing Belmont, a decent team who came out of the exhibition season 2-0 and had had a successful first regular season game, beating West Vancouver 41-0.
But the Hyacks' determination to win overpowered Belmont's clean record.
The New West boys scored five touchdowns, with quarterback Tommy Robertson throwing to Stewart Sommerfeld, Tristan Sands and Matt Seymour for three of the five touchdowns. Running back Angelo Tanjuaquio had a 32-yard touchdown run, and Kale Brock scored on an 18-yard run to cap off the victory.
"I was very pleased with all phases of our game against a much improved, physical, Belmont team. The kids had a very bad taste in their mouths with what happened last week, and it showed with how hard we played tonight," said head coach Farhan Lalji.
While the varsity Hyacks are back on the winning side of things, the junior Hyacks continued their winning ways with a 31-0 victory over American opponents Mt. Vernon in exhibition play.
Despite a shortage of defensive players, the Hyacks kept Belmont from gaining too much ground, allowing the visitors to score only two touchdowns.
"Defensively we were short a few bodies on the D-line, so a lot of guys had to play more than they were used to, but they all stayed hungry throughout the game," Lalji said.
Jeremy Stewart and James Nicolas led the team defence with nine and eight tackles respectively.
The younger Hyacks haven't lost a game yet, and they're currently 4-0, including both exhibition and regular season play. This Thursday (tomorrow), the Haycks take on Coquitlam's Terry Fox in their final exhibition game.
Last season Terry Fox went undefeated and won the junior varsity championships. This season they're off to a good start, beating both Mt. Douglas and Pitt Meadows earlier this month.
The game starts at 5:30 p.m. at Mercer Stadium.
