The tall defender, who received the best-afield medal for the losing side in the 6.9 (45) to 4.5 (29) final at Simonds Stadium on Wednesday, said the 2017 crop of St Patrick’s students were disappointed not to be able to contribute another win to the school’s rich footballing history.

“We gave it our all – to get that result is pretty devastating for the boys,” he said.

“Hopefully next year we can win and get it (the shield) back to St Pats.”

The Ballarat-based college had won six consecutive shields, but has gone down in the last two deciders.

On Wednesday, rain wreaked havoc in a low-scoring, scrappy first half, which saw St Bernard’s lead 1.6 to 1.1 following a goalless second term from both sides.

St Patrick’s dug deep in the third term, putting through 2.1 to 1.1 in the hard-fought contest to take a one-point lead into three-quarter-time.

“In the third quarter, we just took a lot more risks and the communication went up,” Scott said.

“We had a bit more drive. We decided we weren’t going to win from what we were doing and we went off that.

“At three-quarter-time, I felt like we were juts going to come out and smash it, but they had a bit more drive for the win.”

St Bernard’s kicked the first three goals of the term and, while St Patrick’s was able to get one back, the Essendon-based school kicked the sealer for a solid win.

Terang Mortlake’s Harry Hobbs, who was another of the eight Hampden league players in St Patrick’s side, said it was a “pretty tough contest all day”.

“They just wanted it a bit more in patches,” he said.

“We fought back pretty hard, but they got away.

“When we are running, we play our best footy … (but at times) we just couldn’t get back to our structures.”