In the all-too-brief period after they won their second successive game last Sunday in Edmonton, the Tiger-Cats had repeatedly said that they were eagerly looking forward to facing the Montreal Alouettes Friday night so they could gauge themselves against the best team in their division.
They came up holding the short end of that measuring stick after the first-place Alouettes dominated most of the final 40 minutes of their 33-16 victory at Tim Hortons Field despite the Ticats taking a crowd-stimulating 7-0 lead on an electric Kenneth George pick-six.
Davis Alexander, the CFL’s latest elusive wunderkind, used his legs, heavy-artillery arm and his receivers horde’s epoxy-like grips to eventually crack a Hamilton defence which was, overall, the Cats’ best unit.
And the fast, hard-hitting, variable Montreal defence which can disguise itself like it’s heading off to a Halloween party, muffled the Tiger-Cat offence at several critical moments, often on second down. Bo Levi Mitchell’s offence didn’t score a touchdown until just under three minutes remained in the game and by then the Cats were down 27-8.
The Als poached two damning interceptions off Mitchell; one with just a minute left in the first half and the Ticats on a very promising march into Montreal territory which led to a field goal that gave the visitors a 10-7 that should have belonged, on the balance of play, to the home team; the other at the Montréal 22-yard line–and the Ticats, down only nine points, driving optimistically—which set up a field goal early in the fourth quarter.
“We didn’t measure up to what we could have,” Mitchell said afterward. “Everything said and done, at the end of the first half we had a chance to take the lead and I put it on myself. I look at it from my point of view: keep momentum on our side and I didn’t do that toward the end of the first half and it got out of our hands there late at the end.”
The Ticats had only five days to prepare for the game and lost to the Alouettes for the eighth straight time, including the last two East semifinals.
The Ticats have to lick their wounds and quickly regroup as they play their second, and final, game of the year against the Als in Montreal Saturday night.
The defence, which was overall the team’s best unit, might have appeared tired late in the game, but in the quiet locker room afterward, they said they weren’t fatigued because they had a well-planned personnel rotation, particularly up front where they spent a lot of time pursuing Alexander, who was sacked three times but avoided many more potential takedowns with his legs.
The Ticats offence had a rough outing and had contributed only a punt for a single until a late march in the final four minutes made the score a little more palatable but this one belonged to the Als who, at 7-1, are now 10 points distant from Hamilton, which fell to 2-and-6.
The Ticats have to lick their wounds and quickly regroup as they play their second, and final, game of the year against the Als in Montreal Saturday night. They needed a split in this series and will have to do it the hard way: on the road.
“I thought we had a good plan,” said Ticats’ head coach Scott Milanovich.
“Obviously we have to score more points on offence. They do a good job of making you execute for an entire drive, not just for a couple of first downs. I don’t know if we had any two-and-outs tonight but we obviously weren’t able to finish on enough of those opportunities.
“It was a tight game for a while; we let it get away from us. We’ll go back to the drawing board and expect to win next week.”
Milanovich was correct in his observation: the Ticats offence did not have any two-and-outs. But hopeful drives were thwarted by the two interceptions, and a third turnover: a misplaced pass at third-and-two from the Alouettes’ 44-yard-line on the Ticats’ opening series after they’d made three aggressive first downs. With the defence playing well that didn’t cost the Ticats anything except temporary possession and field position.
“I think the third-and-two early was a big play, from a momentum standpoint,” Milanovich said. “And then we get the turnover, and maybe we have a little bigger lead. We had some second downs that I thought we could have converted that we didn’t. We had a couple of penalties on offence that put us in long yardage. Two of them I can think of that took us out of reasonable down and distance.”
The Ticats had seven penalties for a whopping 115 yards, three of them crucial ones on offence, the return of a problem which had plagued them earlier in the season.
And the Als have been the hottest team in the CFL since the middle of last season because they can take ruthless advantage of the other team’s mistakes, don’t get thrown by opponents’ good stretches and make a lot of plays themselves; some big, some small, but all adding up to something substantial over 60 minutes. The Ticats are still working toward that formula.
Montreal outscored Hamilton 27-1 after George’s interception in the first minute of the second quarter had ignited the home crowd as the Ticats made a huge first-half play—they blocked kicks that led immediately to touchdowns in each of the wins over the Argos and Elks – for the third straight game.
But the audience of 20,426 turned apprehensive after Alexander hit Charleston Rambo, who had an outstanding night, for a game-tying touchdown.
Then they grew sullen when the Ticats were steadily marching late in the first half to regain their lead but Mitchell’s ball was picked off by Bryce Cosby. Just 50 seconds later, Alexander put them into field goal position abetted mightily by a pass interference call against safety Robert Panabaker to send the Als into the half up 10-7.
He escaped trouble often enough to complete 53 percent of his second down opportunities, compared to the Ticats’ 46 percent, and many of them were for big distance on 2nd-and-long. He barely overthrew a couple of open receivers or that would have been an even higher percentage. Alexander’s receivers helped with outstanding catches and he ended up completing passes to eight different receivers. In fact, the two teams combined for a whopping 17 different men catching passes last night. Rambo had four catches, three on second down, for 86 total yards and Tyson Philpot, in the early running for Canadian player of the year, had five for 82 yards.
Alexander, making his first start for the Alouettes, was terrific after the Ticats had stifled him early. He demonstrated that his comeback win off the bench last week against Saskatchewan was not a fluke as he showed great poise before he was temporarily removed from the game after a very questionable 25-yard roughing the passer call against Casey Sayles with about six minutes left. From this corner’s view, the officials’ assessment of a grade-2 roughing the passing call was far too excessive.
Alexander eventually returned but in the meantime, his replacement Caleb Evans threw a 39-yard touchdown strike on the very next play after that 25-yard penalty to Hamilton. That erased basically all chances of a comeback with a 12-point deficit turning into an insurmountable 27-8 lead.
Prior to all of that, because of the improved defence, the Ticats were still in a position to win, down only 12 points with over six minutes to play—plenty of time in the CFL– after Nik Constantinou’s perfect punt at 3rd-and-d7, caromed out of bounds at the Montreal seven-yard line. But 103 yards later Evans’ pass to David Dallaire put the game away.
Milanovich questioned himself on that punt call but from our vantage point, it was the correct one, given how strongly the defence had been playing and how craftily Constantinou has been shaping his punts as he becomes accustomed to the pro, and CFL, game.
“We talk about it in hindsight now, I wish I had gone for it on 3rd-and-7,” Milanovich said. “The plan was to pin them deep and for a quick two-and-out. But credit them; they made some great plays.”
All night. And the Ticats didn’t make enough of them.
Hamilton will have some rest before heading to Montréal and the players we talked with after the game prefer to come right back at a very good team which has just beaten them.
“Always,” Mitchell said. “It’s one of the unique things about the CFL. Playing teams back-to-back and getting a chance to go back in. You saw on the field, it was chippy. The rivalry’s there: we’re fighting and we’re ready for it
“You’ve gotta play hot going into the end of the season but you have to get a ticket to the dance and in order to do that we’ve got to get us some wins, for sure. This would have been a nice one to have at home in front of the fans: we could have made that happen. Next week’s going to be very important, as is every game in this league.
“Any time you’re playing a team in your division it’s always a four-point swing, so trying to get this one back on them, it’s going to be a big one.”
CATS CLAUSES: Former Ticats’ running back James Butler had another solid game, blocking well and getting 19 touches for a total of 110 yards, 69 of those from 12 rushes … rookie Shemar Bridges continues to lead the Ticats; he had 9 receptions for 76 yards … Kiondré Smith had six catches for 40 yards … Tim White’s late touchdown was his third in two games … despite the controversial 25-yard roughing the passer call, DT Casey Sayles had an outstanding game with four defensive tackles, one for a loss, plus a sack. Barely 24 hours earlier his wife Katie gave birth to the couple’s second child, son Barrett Nelson Sayles, which is why Sayles made a cradle-rocking motion after his sack … Kyle Wilson and DeWayne Hendrix had the other Ticat sacks … it was only the second game of the season that Marc Liegghio wasn’t called upon for a field goal attempt. He’s made 14 straight … Taylor Powell went 5-for-6 and 39 yards in late relief of Bo Levi Mitchell … former Ticats’ all-star safety and later Special Teams Coordinator Craig Butler was honoured as the Alumnus of Distinction …Als QB Davis Alexander was 19-for-27 for 262 yards, 1 TD and 1 interception. He rushed for another 16 yards … Charleston Rambo had four catches for 86 yards and a TD, while Tyson Philpot had 5 for 82 yards Montréal RB Sean Thomas Erlington and DT Dylan Wynn were given video board tributes for their time as Ticats.