The countdown is on and now just one day away from playing in a second 9-man football provincial final in three years for the Shaunavon Shadows.

After claiming a provincial gold medal in 2015 in a 42-28 win over the Delisle Rebels, the Shadows are hoping to duplicate that success again in 2017 as they host the provincial final this Saturday.

Shaunavon's head coach, Garret Glasrud, notes although there are some obvious similarities between the two teams, both 2015 and 2017's rosters certainly have their own strengths.

"We've got a lot of athletes on both of those squads. In 2015, we had some guys there that were exceptional athletes," he said. "This year I think we have a little bit more depth maybe at the lineman position - both on offense and defense - that's paid off a little bit more for us this year obviously knowing that our competition is just as tough as it was (in 2015)."

This season, Shaunavon is coming off an 18-0 quarter-final win at home over the Unity Warriors, a 57-13 win on the road in Nipawin in the semi-finals, and now look to a familiar opponent back at Shadows Field in the SHSAA 2A 9-man Football Provincial Final.

9-man Conference 2 opponent Indian Head rolls into town after a 28-15 quarter-final win over Delisle, and a 32-7 win last weekend at home over Foam Lake.

The Shadows and Broncs met once in the regular season, as Shaunavon emerged with a 37-26 win to clinch second place in the conference behind the 3A Lumsden Devils, and dropping Indian Head down into third.

Glasrud says his team spent this week's practices fine-tuning their game for a re-match in the final, perhaps preparing to bring out some new tricks as well.

"I think our blocking is going to play a big part - we've tried to work on our blocking schemes a little bit, and just make sure that we're well-rounded as far as the running-game goes," Glasrud added. "Hopefully we can improve a little bit on that by Saturday so that when we come out to play them, hopefully they'll see something that we haven't shown them yet."

As was the case leading up to the provincial quarter-final game against Unity, the Shadows head coach says the community is buzzing at the thought of their team playing for gold at home once again, and that the support has been overwhelming.

"It's huge - we've had tons of support from all of our parents, fans, and just the whole community," Glasrud said. "They're all behind us, social media is lighting up, getting lots of text messages and phone calls from people, even far away that have ties to Shaunavon and have family members still in the area, and they're just passing on the best support that they can, and so I think it's a huge thing for us and it's great to see."

You can listen to Bourassa Plumbing Shaunavon Shadows Football live on 1490 CJSN with the SWT Pre-game Show starting at 1:45 p.m. and the Shaunavon Tirecraft Kick-off scheduled for 2 p.m. tomorrow afternoon.