Steelers blank Bulldogs in home finale

There is still work to be done, but the Sault Steelers wrapped up the home portion of their Northern Football Conference schedule on a positive note.

After dropping a pair of road games in recent weeks, the Steelers blanked the North Bay Bulldogs 35-0 on Saturday night at Rocky DiPietro Field. 

For Steelers Coach Brandon Lewis, the game is “good for morale,” but he would still like to see more.

“We still need the practice and still nee the reps,” Lewis said, adding that low turnouts at practice “have become the norm.”

“It has to change,” Lewis added. “I’m hoping that it’s something we change going forward this week.”

Lewis was pleased with the Steelers ability to turn broken plays into yardage and points against North Bay, but it’s not something the team can afford to allow happen often.”

“We were sloppy and it showed that we weren’t getting the reps at the beginning of the game,” Lewis said. “There were a lot of broken plays. Making something out of broken plays, you’ll take the score but it’s not the discipline that you want.”

The Steelers opened the scoring as Alonzo Clarke ran the ball in from 12-yards out with just over five minutes to go in the opening quarter.

In the second quarter, Clarke would make it 14-0 on a one-yard run with 6:55 to go in the half.

With 1:31 to go in the half. Josh Gauthier ran the ball in from 32 yards out to make it 21-0.

Matt Gauthier would make it 28-0 Steelers by returning an interception 40 yards for a touchdown with 7.3 seconds to go in the half.

With 3:15 to go in the third quarter, Steven Hiiemaa ran the ball in from seven yards out to make it 35-0.

Hiiemaa finished the day with 202 yards rushing on 25 carries.

“He was excellent,” Lewis said of the young back. “The kid has got a lot of heart. You can never say enough about him.”

Josh Gauthier had 76 yards rushing on three carries.

Defensively for the Steelers, Dalton Povey and Matt Gauthier had three tackles each. Fred Casselman, Nate Edwards and Jordan Bruyere had 2.5 tackles each. 

Gwinyai Guta had 26 yards rushing for the Bulldogs while Jesse Shoults and Cameron Ford ran the ball for 15 yards each.

Patrick Petrie had 4.5 tackles for North Bay and an interception. Josh had 34.5 tackles for the Bulldogs.

The Steelers wrap up regular season action on July 21 on the road in Sarnia against the Imperials.