Photo Credit: Freeze Frame Photos

Coming off a home win in Sault Ste Marie on July 20th in Sault Ste Marie over the visiting Tri City Outlaws, the first place (4-2) Sault Steelers hit the field at Rocky DiPietro Field to host the fourth place (0-6) Sudbury Spartans in Ontario Power 5 Football League action.

At 10:55 of the opening quarter, Steeler Brady Smith found the Spartan uprights for a 16 yard field goal to give the Sault a 3 – 0 lead. With Sudbury on the Steeler two yard line with 5:12 remaining in the first half, quarterback Adam Rocha broke through the Sault defensive line to score the Spartans lone major of the contest in Sault Ste Marie. Victor Paajanen added to extra point to bring the Spartans lead to 7 – 3. Michael Reid tackles a Sudbury defender in the endzone to concede a point on the Spartans to close the gap to 7 – 4 for the Sault. 2:15 into the final quarter of the Steelers 2024 OP5FL season, Reid evades two tackles to be brought down in the Sault endzone conceding a point to the Spartans lead to bring the lead to 8 – 4. After a Steeler fumble on the two yard of the Spartans, Rocha kneels to concede another two points to Steelers to give Sudbury a 8 – 6 win and advance to the OP5FL Championship in Sarnia when they will face the Imperials on August 7th.

Michael Reid told Saultsports that “Lack of preparation killed us. We didn’t get quality practices in to add to our offence and Sudbury had a plan which they executed very well. We fought a hard battle but they were just better prepared than we were. Defensively we contained them well- besides a few small errors there’s not much more we could’ve done. It’s tough, but it’s football. This is what happens. Now we’re just shifting our focus to retool for 2025.”

Visit Freeze Frame Photos by Bob Davies photo gallery of the semi final between the Sudbury Spartans versus Sault Steelers in OP5FL action.