Despite losing in the Grade 8 football championship, the Lord Tweedsmuir Panthers had a successful 2024 football campaign.

The Grade 8 team went 2-3 in the regular season and did well in playoffs. In the playoffs, the Frank Paulicelli coached squad delivered a solid semi-final performance to earn themselves a berth in the championship game against the third-place Vancouver College Fighting Irish.

To start the year, the Grade 8s lost a hard-fought exhibition game against College 24-12. In their first regular season game, they beat their cross-town competition Holy Cross by a score of 7-0. In their second game of the season, they downed Mission鈥檚 Heritage Park 35-0. In game 3, they lost 16-0 to St. Thomas More. In their fourth game of the season, the Panthers lost a close one to Notre Dame, losing by two points, 18-16. To close out the regular season, the Panthers lost another battle with College, losing 16-6 at Lord Tweedsmuir.

Even with the final regular season loss, the Panthers took some momentum into the playoffs from the battle with the Fighting Irish. The Panthers travelled to Burnaby to take on the first-place, 5-0, Notre Dame Jugglers in the semifinal. In the game, LT鈥檚 defence smothered the Jugglers offence, only allowing them one TD. On the other side of the ball, the Panthers put up 28 points for a 28-8 upset victory鈥攁nd a return match up with VC. (Matt Esaw, HC, led his Fighting Irish to a 36-16 win over second-place St. Thomas More in the other semifinal.)

VC assistant coach Prab Bal said Lord Tweedsmuir has a good team and, despite the scoreline in the championship final, the Panthers had a great year.

鈥淲e had two close battles with them during the season,鈥� said Bal. 鈥淭hey are a well-coached team and they are building quite the program there.鈥�

In the final, Vancouver College won 24-0.