In the end, they still had a chance. But it was the beginning which ultimately cost them that chance.
“Too many mistakes early in the game, we had to play catch-up in the second half,” Tiger-Cats head coach Scott Milanovich said after Hamilton fell behind 19-7 at halftime and lost 32-24 to the Stampeders, dulling Bo Levi Mitchell’s return to Calgary.
So, the Ticats will have to wait yet another year to try, again, to reverse the discouraging hex of opening day, as they remain stalled at just four Game 1 wins since calendars flipped over into the 2000s.
There were certainly some positive indicators: most notably Mitchell’s significantly re-configured physique and theoretical approach to the game; the offence’s resurgence in the second half; James Butler’s impactful first time in uniform this season; and some promising work by the receivers; plus a late march which gave them a shot, had they been able to execute an on-side kickoff.
There were many other positive signs which we promise we’ll get to, a little later in this column.
But there were also too many negative ones to win a road game, a one-score game, in a locale that has so often (one McMahon Stadium win in 19 years) been a dead-end street for the Ticats.
You could start with the last-ditch on-side kick with 71 seconds left and work backwards from there. It didn’t go the legally-required distance of 10 yards and served as a metaphor for the periodic troubles the Cats’ special teams experienced all night, despite getting three field goals from Marc Liegghio and some decent punts from recent addition Nik Constantinou.
They couldn’t stifle rookie Stampeder returner Erik Brooks, who was elusive and elastic. Constantinou’s attempted coffin corner punt instead bounced for an unwanted single point. They sent 13 men onto the field for one field goal attempt. And Liegghio’s only field goal miss was returned 85 yards by Brooks to set up a Stamp field goal that represented a critical 10-point swing, as it followed Ticat rookie Shemar Bridges being unable to grab a catchable sure touchdown pass near the Calgary goal line after a commendable drive by the awakening offence to open the second half. It was one of at least five drops by Ticat receivers.
And the return units were unable to spring Lawrence Woods III, which was compounded by him having to also play wide-side cornerback after defensive back Richard Leonard suffered an unspecified injury in the second quarter and didn’t return. Woods was exhausted.
But it wasn’t just special teams which had game-altering mistakes.
Calgary quarterback Jake Maier confounded the Ticat defence, creating time and space as the Stampeders scored on each of their first five possessions –although the Hamilton defence held them to field goals on four of them –and generally responded with long possessions after Ticat offensive surges. The Ticats had trouble adjusting to play-action, both on the run against the flow and on passes.
And Stamps scored the only touchdown of the first half when Cam Echols outleapt three Ticat defenders surrounding him. Mills rushed for 87 well-read yards and Maier extended plays by reading the Hamilton attack and rolling out, mercilessly probing the wide side after the Ticats secondary had to recalibrate in Leonard’s absence.
And while the Hamilton offence netted 459 offensive yards before it could even execute their first snap of the season it was flagged for too many men on the field, a mistake for which Milanovich volunteered to take the blame.
“It’s just a bad way to start a game, first and long,” he said. “We settled down a little bit. I thought Bo settled down and played well, kind of after the interception (late in the second quarter).”
Mitchell and White had trouble getting on the same page all night, Mitchell overthrew White in the end zone and his ball to Bridges went over the rookie receiver’s head and into the arms of new Stamp Demario Houston, the veteran ball hawk who was obtained for exactly that reason. And there were at least five drops, including critical ones by White, Dunbar and Bridges–who was otherwise excellent. White’s miss, like Bridges’, came at the Calgary goal line and who knows what would have happened had either—or both—of them been caught.
