Mike Reilly might have been named the game’s most valuable player, but it was a heads-up call by coach Chris Jones that allowed the Edmonton Eskimos to end a 10-year Grey Cup drought.
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The Eskimos won the Canadian Football League title for the first time since 2005. For Ottawa, who came in the game as a decided underdog, it was the ideal start.
It was a dramatic finish for the Investors Group Field sellout of 36,634, the second-smallest Grey Cup attendance since 1975. For the first time in team history, it saw four receivers go over 1,000 yards, while Burris led the CFL with 5,703 passing yards.
An Ottawa CFL team hadn’t been to the CFL title game since 1981, when the Rough Riders lost 26-23 to the Eskimos.
The Redblacks scored two quick touchdowns on their opening two drives to start the game and held a 13-10 lead following the first quarter.
The Redblacks advanced to the big game in just their second year in the league.
In the first quarter, the Redblacks took an early 13-0 lead with touchdowns on their first two possessions before momentum shifted in Edmonton’s favour.
The Eskimos also finished the season registering their 10th straight win, all coming after Reilly returned as the club’s starter.
Henry Burris found Patrick Lavoie for a touchdown on the REDBLACKS first posession of the game. But we had ample opportunities to go down and put this game out of reach.
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Jay Ferguson, 28, from Edmonton, arrived in Winnipeg with two friends Thursday and has been living and breathing the Grey Cup ever since. Adarius Bowman (six foot three, 217 pounds), Canadian Shamed Chambers (six foot three, 219 pounds), Mate Shoehorn (six foot two, 210 pounds) and CFL top rookie Derek Walker (six foot two, 185 pounds) all present match-up problems for a Redblacks’ defensive back field with only one player listed over six feet. The Eskimos’ offence then came through, though, pulling together a touchdown drive and a two-point convert, getting a defensive stop, and then grinding out enough first downs to win. Edmonton took a 17-16 lead on Reilly’s 2-yard pass to Shavers with 12 seconds left in the half. Chris Milo added a convert, single and two field goals. That set up another scoring drive, with two Powell runs and two Burris strikes to Ernest Jackson, including the seven-yard touchdown pass.
