Brothers Macho and Markos Bockru are making a huge impact for the No. 6 ranked Bisons football team, with the former starting at short side wideout for a second year in a row and the latter starting as a cornerback.

While Macho, who's in his fourth year of eligibility, grabbed a number of headlines this offseason as a top prospect to watch for in the 2020 CFL draft — it's actually younger brother Markos who first strapped on the pads.

Soccer had been the family's sport growing up, but all that changed when Markos turned 12.

"I played at the St. Vital Mustangs community club and I loved it," he says. "The physicality of it was way different than soccer or any other sport that I'd played. That's what drew me towards it and made me drop every other sport after high school."

Interestingly, Markos played receiver at the beginning of his career before switching to defensive back in grade ten at Dakota Collegiate. In his senior season he was a jack of all trades, suiting up at receiver and defensive back. But in his heart, he knew the secondary was where he belonged. It also helped that he grew a few inches towards graduation, moulding into an athletic and rangy 6'3" corner.

Macho's football journey started when he was in grade ten. A fullback on the soccer pitch, he was originally content to take footy as far as he could. But the persistence of some friends as well as a desire to try the game out eventually took a hold of him. It ended up being one of the best decisions of his life.

"It was nice seeing [Markos] play first and seeing that it was something that he started to excel at," Macho says.

"I think that once he got taller and started getting more physical, he learned that he was getting real good at it. That's motivating as a big brother, to say hey, my little brother is doing it, why not try it out. It worked out."

One of the pair's more memorable high school football moments at Dakota occurred when Macho was in grade 12 and Markos in grade ten, as they got to play on the same team together for the first time.

"It was cool being able to say that you played on the same team as your older brother," Markos says. "I did not think that we'd end up being on the same team after high school."

It's funny how things work out sometimes.

After graduating in 2015, Macho chose to play a year with the Winnipeg Rifles of the Canadian Junior Football League (CJFL), as he knew he wouldn't be starting right out of high school and wanted to hone his skills more as a player so that he'd be prepared once he made the transition to university. A year later, he secured a spot on Manitoba's roster and has been grinding it out ever since.

"It was a good base to learn from," Macho says of his time with the Rifles.

"Not everyone can kind of get that going at the junior level, it depends where you're at. But I guess that's an argument that everyone has a different take on. If you're going to play right out of high school in university, which is really rare, then take that jump. But if you want to develop for a year and still get playing time, and then come in and play right away in your second year post-high school in university, then that's the route I would recommend."

Back at Dakota, Markos was in the process of figuring out where he wanted to play after high school in 2017. He'd had offers from a number of Canadian universities but ultimately chose to continue his playing career in the states with Minnesota-Crookston, an NCAA Division II school.

"Playing football in the states is just different than Canadian football," he says. "I did have options to play in Canada, including Manitoba, but I just thought I'd try something different. I always knew that if it didn't work out, I'd have something to fall back to, which was coming here, regardless as to whether I were to play or have to work my way up."

As fate would have it, Markos and Macho would be reunited for the 2018 season, after the former suffered an injury and decided it was in his best interest to come back home. His timing couldn't have been any better, as he was able to practice against his older brother daily while also watching him mould into a play-making receiver that the Bisons utilized in a number of ISO formations to the tune of over 500 yards receiving.

This year, both Bockrus are prospering. In the season opener last week, Markos helped shut down the defending Hardy Cup champion Saskatchewan Huskies offence to the tune of three-and-a-half tackles and a pass breakup. Macho picked up right where he left off in 2018, collecting six receptions for 99 yards and three touchdowns and was named the conference's offensive player of the week. 

"We've come a long way," Macho says.

"Back [in high school], we were both good athletes but we didn't have full grasp on the football game yet. Fast-forwarding to now, I feel like we both kind of have a big role on the team to play, and he does it at one of the harder spots on the field to play, at weak side corner. And I'm doing it just on the other side of the field at weak side wideout. We took separate routes but both ended up at the same spot, so that's nice to see."