Twice in the past couple of weeks, the Calgary Stampeders had fallen agonizingly short in fourth quarters.
Those are the types of losses that stick with you.
So when the final whistle went off and the Stamps (3-3) could look up at the scoreboard and see that they’d survived a rough-and-tumble game with the B.C. Lions (5-2) and had earned themselves a 25-24 win, there were a lot of emotions they were feeling.
This group needed this one, plain and simple.
“It feels damn good,” said Stamps quarterback Jake Maier. “You can’t sugarcoat it, it’s an amazing feeling. We work hard every day and guys care the world for what we do. To be on the other end, it’s an amazing feeling.
“I told them at halftime, I felt like we were battle-tested. I think we’d been on the wrong side of it a few too many times and when you go through hard times like that, you can come out the other side eventually and, eventually, we got to that side.”
The margins were as tight as they get on Sunday against the Lions, who are generally considered the best team in the CFL in the early days of this season.
Nothing came easy for the Stamps, and the win wasn’t secure until the final second.
On their last drive, the Stamps needed to eat the clock and were desperate to avoid putting the ball back in Lions QB Vernon Adams Jr.’s hands. And they did it, but not without a scary moment when Jalen Philpot fumbled the ball, only to recover it a few agonizing seconds later.
But ultimately, the Stamps did what was needed.
“You wonder, if you don’t win that you’re really struggling to look in the mirror and wonder what we have to do to come up with a win in these tight, tight games,” said GM/head coach Dave Dickenson said.
“Our guys stepped up, though, and found the ball a couple times. It was a back and forth game and it felt good with some of the guys who maybe were in situations they hadn’t been in where making the plays whereas in the past maybe we were just kind of waiting for someone else to make the play.”
Maier has shown considerable improvement over the past two weeks and was on his game on Sunday. He completed 25-of-32 passes for 307 yards and three touchdowns and, most importantly, led the Stamps on a game-winning touchdown late in the fourth quarter that saw him make big connections to both Marken Michel and the excellent Clark Barnes.
Philpot deserves a lot of credit, too. He caught six passes for 79 yards, including an absolutely unreal touchdown that saw him tap his toe only a few short centimetres from the sideline to secure the score.
And defensively, the Stampeders created havoc. The defensive line put relentless pressure on Adams, who completed 17-of-31 passes for 192 yards and threw for two touchdowns but also two interceptions.
James Vaughters was credited with the Stamps’ lone sack on the night, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. They repeatedly had Adams scrambling and got their hands on him consistently. He had a difficult night, and the d-line deserves credit for that.
And the defensive backs showed up, too, with Tyler Richardson landing a pick and Kobe Williams securing an interception late in the fourth quarter for arguably the biggest play of the game.
“(This win) means everything, because every game we play we feel like we earn the win but we didn’t make it happen,” Williams said. “We were sad about it, but we finally got the win we wanted.”
After a treacherous first six games of the season, the Stamps will now have a chance to start moving up the standings with a relatively easier stretch.
The CFL schedule makers did them no favours by putting them up against the lowly Ottawa Redblacks on Friday night – seriously, who thinks that’s enough time between games? – but then they’ve got a back-to-back against an inconsistent Toronto Argonauts squad, a return date against the Redblacks and the Labour Day series against the Edmonton Elks.
There are some very winnable games in there and Sunday night’s triumph over the Lions means they’re very much still in the mix.
QUICK HITS
The Stampeders did a lovely job paying tribute to Wally Buono at halftime. The longtime head coach was added to the team’s Wall of Fame and it was great to see the organization get back to honouring its history … Returner/receiver Erik Brooks was hurt early in Sunday’s game, and Dickenson said he suspected he had fractured his arm … Peyton Logan deserves a lot of credit for the job he did stepping in on returns. He had a nice game.