Bert Faibish
Ticats.ca
Eventually it had to happen.
In their fourth meeting of the season and with the law of averages in their side, the Toronto Argonauts managed to find a way to win, defeating the Ticats 16-13 on Sunday afternoon in the Eastern Semi-Final.
Despite some very impressive performances from some Ticats players, it seemed that for each step forward they took, they followed up with two steps back.
Turnovers plagued Hamilton all day, including two fumbles on punt returns, one of which resulted in Toronto’s only touchdown of the game.
Despite five turnovers in the game, Hamilton was still in a position to try and tie the game with 10 seconds left on the clock, but Kevin Glenn’s pass deflected off the hands of Arland Bruce III, directly into the arms of a waiting Argo defender.
“I have faith in this team, we practice those situations and we’re capable of driving the field with that amount of time left,” said Glenn.
To even be in that situation was remarkable, after Glenn injured his knee in the second quarter on a hit by Rickey Foley after the ball was thrown.
Looking bad at the time, Glenn later gave the team hope when he jogged back onto the field a few minutes into the third quarter and fought through the pain, finishing the game.
While hosting a playoff game for the second straight year is something for the Ticats to be proud of, the hardest improvement to make is to jump from being a competitive team to a dominant one.
“Championship-calibre teams respond to these kinds of setbacks,” said defensive end Stevie Baggs. “This is a huge setback for us but now we have to regroup in the off-season and come back next year with a hunger,” he added.
