2015 U.P. Football Preview: Finlandia

HANCOCK — Expansion football teams are for the most part hit or miss. So what can we expect from the Finlandia Lions as they get ready to take the field for the first time in school history? Just a bunch of kids hungry for their first win.

The team has been practicing at McAfee Field for about a week now. Some of the players took part in spring camp, so they came into the fall ahead of the curve. And that extra preparation was useful to those players.

“It was fun but it was hard. We started with 24 and we ended with 18 by the end of the spring, which wasn’t really spring up here because we had snow all over the field. But it was pretty much getting to know the schemes and the basics just to get ready for the fall,” sophomore linebacker/safety Tyler Windahl said.

“We’re laying down the foundation of what becomes a pyramid and what we can have success with. That’s very important so these first few practices, people are learning, people are understanding just the basics of what we want to do. And that’s what we want to do. We want to get that going and then just polish that up and be ready for that first game,” said head coach Tim Driscoll.

And that first game will be at home against Alma College on September 5th and everyone is excited to be a part of that ground–breaking moment.

“Making history. I was the first to ever touch this field with Hancock’s junior varsity team. We won the first game on this field and now I’m playing the first college game on this field. It’s a big thing,” said sophomore offensive lineman Adrian Saterstad.

“It’s going to be a great day, an exciting day. And this whole fall camp, we’re gearing towards our first game. We’re going to take it one game at a time and that’s the first one. In my experience coaching at established programs, there’s such a big package offense and such a big package defensively and you want to put everything in at fall camp and then you trim it down going into that first game,” Driscoll said