The Canadian Press
CALGARY – The BC Lions fell deep into a hole in the first half of the Western Final on Sunday night and never could quite dig themselves out.
The loss ended the BC’s hopes at a trip to Toronto to play in the 104th Grey Cup and was a disappointing end to the Lions’ season, after having one of their most successful years in the last few years.
“As I told the club, I was proud of what they’ve accomplished, what they’ve become,” said head coach Wally Buono. “Obviously we weren’t happy about today. To take today and let it be a whole season that’s not fair to them either. They’ve done a lot of good things. They’ve played a lot of good football and a lot of exciting football. Today we just played a better team. They played better, they were better prepared, they executed better (and) they tackled better.”
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The Lions found themselves chasing the Stamps the entire game after Bo Levi Mitchell moved his team down the field to score their first major on Calgary’s first possession of the ball game.
After the early score, quarterback Jonathon Jennings and his club just couldn’t seem to find their groove.
“I’ve been in the game 100 years and I’ve seen this 100 times,” Buono said of his team’s first half struggles. “I’ve been on the other side when it’s been good and I’ve been on this side when it’s been bad. It’s like anything, once it starts rolling you’ve got to break the momentum. In the first half, we couldn’t break the momentum.”
The Lions’ bench boss tried to swing that momentum back into his team’s direction by subbing in Travis Lulay for Jennings – who tossed a pick-six to end the first half – with the Lions trailing 32-0. And that change behind centre did ignite something as it led to BC’s first major score of the contest.
Lulay moved the chains down the field and found Emmanuel Arceneaux in the end zone. But after the quarterback tossed an interception a few plays later, Buono decided to go back to his youngster.
“At half time I felt it would be important to go out and try to get a spark and I thought Travis gave us a spark,” Buono said of the change at quarterback. “If we’d have scored on the interception I probably would have kept him in. It was also important to us to try to get Jonathon back in to make sure that he didn’t leave 2016 with the bad taste of the first half in his mouth.”
Jennings connected with Chris Rainey late in the fourth, but with just under two minutes left, it was too little, too late for BC’s comeback. The 24-year-old pivot finished his night connecting on 17-of-24 passes for 206 yards, one touchdown and one interception.
Despite the loss, and not reaching his goal of getting to the Grey Cup, Buono still wanted his team to relish in the fact that they had an excellent 2016 season.
“This is the end of a, for us, a very exciting, very good 2016,” he said. “We probably accomplished more than people thought we could. For me, I still feel disappointed because my goal was to be in Toronto and be able to sip out of the Cup and that didn’t happen.”
The Lions finished the regular season with one of the best defensive groups in the league that included ‘Team 100’ – Solomon Elimimian and Adam Bighill – the first teammates in CFL history to reach 100+ tackle in a season.
Arceneaux put on a show almost every single time he hit the gridiron and he reached 1000+ yards this season – the first Lion to do so since 2006. Bryan Burnham was also a bright spot for BC this season, making spectacular catches and finishing the season with 1392 receiving yards.
Jennings also hit a milestone this season, as he passed for over 5000 yards, becoming just the fourth Lion to do so in a single season.
The duo in the backfield, Jeremiah Johnson and Anthony Allen, provided options for Buono to roll with as they both performed every time they were called upon and Rainey was versatile playing special teams as well as on offence.
And as the book closes on Buono’s team’s season, he now looks ahead to next week’s final showdown where he and his team will be “spectators.”
“They’ve done a great job all year,” Buono said of the Stampeders. “They were the worthy victor today and it should be a great Grey Cup between two very good teams.”
