Canadian Press
EDMONTON — The Edmonton Eskimos needed a victory, and they needed one badly.
With a shuffled offensive line and quarterback Mike Reilly fighting off the remnants of a nasty flu bug, the Esks pulled it together in a big way en route to an 18-point victory over the visiting Ottawa REDLACKS on Saturday afternoon.
“It was a great team victory, all three phases did their job,” Edmonton head coach Jason Maas told EdmontonEsks.com. “We talked about it during the week — believe in your teammates, believe in your team (and) go make plays.”
The Esks’ O-line did not allow a single sack and gave Reilly the chance to stand in and sling the ball around against the REDBLACKS.
“They did their jobs, they were physical up front,” explained Maas. “Not giving up a sack, with the pressure (Ottawa) brought Mike didn’t get hit a lot. It was a great job up front; for them to be professional like that says a lot about what they’re doing.”
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Reilly’s numbers were nothing short of phenomenal, especially given the fact he missed the final two days of preparation for Saturday’s game with a stomach bug.
“Two nights ago I spent the whole night in the shower,” chuckled Reilly, who completed over 80 per cent of his passes for 369 yards and a touchdown in the win. “I was just trying to deal with something (where) when you’ve got kids, one of them passed it on to me.”
Getting back into the end zone for the first time in more than two games was a weight off the collective shoulders of Edmonton’s offence.
“It’s tough when you go that long without a touchdown,” continued Reilly. “We’ve scored a lot of touchdowns this year, but we haven’t had a stretch like that here in a long time.”
Bryant Mitchell was Reilly’s favoured target on the afternoon, hauling in over half of his total pass yards with a video game-like 190 receiving yards.
“We don’t feel like we came in here and got lucky, we just got back to what we’re used to — we were out of it for 10 quarters,” summarized the veteran pivot. “It’s a big win, and hopefully we can carry it over to next week.”
