The Shaunavon Shadows quest to claim the SHSAA's provincial title begins with home-field advantage Friday night as they'll tangle with a familiar foe.
Moose Jaw Vanier will visit Smith Field to face the Shadows, with the winner advancing into the provincial quarter-finals and the losers' season coming to an end.
Shaunavon won 42-0 on October 4 against the Vikings but the score was only 7-0 at halftime.
"We had to make some adjustments at halftime, the gameplan wasn't working to the extent we expected," Shadows head coach Aaron Audette said. "We've got to take advantage of our speed. We've got speed on both sides of the ball that I think is a tough matchup for them."
Audette pointed to increasing the touches starting running back Cash Lewans will see in the playoffs as they lean on their top players. Although having a senior quarterback, Kaleb Little, who helped guide the team to a provincial final appearance last year gives the Shadows two cornerstones on the offensive side.
"Between the two of them we should have some success," he said.
The Shadows suffered their first loss last week to the Lumsden Devils 53-27. The game was much closer until the final few minutes of the fourth quarter when Shaunavon racked up some penalties and Lumsden opened it up.
"It was a close game, 33-27 with about four minutes left," he said. "Maybe we did just run out of gas against a 45-man roster, with our 22-man roster... We were able to push them and hang with them."
Shaunavon finished the season 4-1 and is the second seed in Conference 2, while Moose Jaw went 3-2 and enters the game as the third seed.
Meanwhile, the fourth-seeded Maple Creek Redmen will visit the number-one-ranked Devils for the other Conference 2 provincial quarter-final birth.