The Olds High School rugby season wasn't quite what the players had hoped for going into the spring, but the players gave it a good effort and many will be back next year, said coach George Grant.
The team finished with a 1-5 record.
He estimated about 16 players will come back for the 2014 OHS rugby season, with a few Grade 9 players moving up to join the team as well.
“We've got quite a few of the girls going to join the Red Deer Titans club rugby and play with them throughout the summer and so that's going to elevate their game quite a bit. They're going to be better prepared come next season because they're going to have these other skills … that they have learned and be able to apply it to our own team,” he said.
The Spartans lost to Oilfields High School of Black Diamond on May 27, failing to qualify for the South Central Zone playoffs.
Despite a losing season, Grant said the girls played hard and will have more experience for next season.
“It's not the outcome that they wanted or I wanted, but it is what it is,” he said, noting that cool weather delaying the season and scheduling issues did hamper the team's efforts to a degree.
No regular football games in September
Looking ahead to the football season in September, the Spartans will only be playing exhibition games in the fall, since the Drumheller Titans indicated in May that the team will be moving from the Big Sky Football Conference to join the Rangeland Football League, leaving the Spartans as the lone team in the Big Sky Football Conference.
Canmore Collegiate High School, last season's only other team in the conference, moved to the Big Rock League.
“We're filling our boots as best we can with exhibition games and unfortunately, when Drumheller left, they left right at the end of May and it made it really difficult for us to arrange games,” said Grant, who is also coach of the football team.
He said so far, five exhibition games have been agreed to for the coming season, with teams as far away as Bonnyville committed to playing games with the Spartans.
“It's too late for us to get into a league due to the fact that everybody else has their schedules solidified,” he said.
Grant said he has made contact with other teams to see if they might be receptive to the Spartans joining those leagues in 2014.
“I'm confident that in a year's time we'll have a league that we'll be joining,” he said.
