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Football is over once again and as one looks , back it can hardly be but regarded as a great sea- son. Faced with the des- ertion of their head coach and number one quarterback the Panthers were regarded assured bets for last place. However,as everyone knows it did not turn out quite that wayas the Pan— thers ended well with a 3-3 record for the regular season and a 5-4 record overall. Just how did a team supposedly picked for last place do as well as they did? _

The number one reason has to be the amazing play of the Panthers defence. From the start they proved they were going to be hard to beat.Led by fourth year

man Peter Sprague,the front four of the Panthers was the toughest to run against In the defensive backfield the big little man of foot ball Doug Crossman led the way. Crossman, was over- looked as an all—star pos— sibly because of his size, but it was his amazing sp- irit and ability to sense plays that kept the Panth— ers defensive backfield alive. This is not to take anything away from the rest of the defensive secondary but I feel Crossman was the leader.

On offensive the Panth ers had a tougher job,to find a replacement for John Dionisi and most peo— ple felt they couldn't.How ever they didn't count on Grant Canvin or Mike Read. Amazingly, it seemed if

one had a bad day, then the other could come on the field and get the job done.

The big man however had to be Dick"Phantom" YOst. Predicted to be a perennial all-star dur— ing his college years at UPEI,Yost had great difficulty in getting untracked in his first three years, but this year

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Yost lived up to his ex- pectations as he picked up over 700 yards rushing and ending up in third place in scoring and making the all—star team.

It was said that Yost brought back shades of

Jim Foley now of the Mon— treal Alouettes. For you who haven't heard of Jim foley,he was Mr.Everything in his years at SDU and UPEI.That puts Yost in pretty high company but I for one feel he deserves it. t Mentionning all the great players on this team would require me to mention all the players on the team Some stood out more than- others but it takes 24 men on offence and defense to make a team and for a col— lege of its size and fin- ance,UPEI gave us a first rate team.

Evident of this is the number of players the Pan— thers palced on the all- star team;placing six,sec- ond only to league leading Saint Marys who had eight. To this six: Dick Yost,run ning back ; Dave Fox,end; Gerry Edge,tackle; Peter Sprague,defensivevtackle; Steve Forse,defensive half back; and, Al Stoddard,