Canada’s Duvernay-Tardif making Super Bowl bid
KANSAS CITY – One of the local media members around his stall on Wednesday asked Laurent Duvernay-Tardif what the Super Bowl means to Canadians.
“Pretty big,” said the very large (6-foot-5, 321-pound) Chiefs right guard. “You’ve got the Stanley Cup, the Super Bowl and then the Grey Cup.”
So it’s No. 2 then?
“Ahh, depends on where you are,” he replied. “But Montreal, it’s a hockey city. So I would start with the Stanley Cup.”
The Habs are on course to miss the playoffs for the third season in a row. Montreal needs the distraction one of its own can provide by playing in the Super Bowl.
And Duvernay-Tardif is ready to give that to his hometown.
You’re familiar with his story – the product of Mont-Saint-Hilaire who grew up in Montreal and played at McGill University, where he would later graduate with a Doctor in Medicine and Master in Surgery while playing for the Chiefs.
But perhaps you’re not aware he is one of only two Canadians still playing who has a shot at being fitted for a Super Bowl ring this season. And that the other, North Bay, Ontario’s Ryan Hunter, is listed as his backup on the Chiefs depth chart.
Hunter was put on the Chief’s 53-man roster for the divisional round game against Houston but was one of the seven “inactives”, which will likely be his fate again this week.
Duvernay-Tardif didn’t get a breather against the Texans. He played all 64 offensive snaps (along with eight on special teams) in the Chiefs historic comeback victory.
To the two Canadians media members in the Kansas City locker room on Wednesday, he explained just what it was like to be in the huddle of a Patrick Mahomes-led offence that rattled off seven consecutive touchdowns – after they had fallen behind 24-0 – in the incredible 51-31 turnaround.
“Offensively, the first drive, I think was a three and out and of course, it’s not what you want,” said Duvernay-Tardif. “But we protected Pat well for those first three plays. Then that happened, the blocked punt, so now it’s 14zero. You go back on the field, you drive a little more, you’re not able to score points .. boom, turnover, they score another touchdown, it’s now 21-zero.
“On the sideline, everybody’s like, ‘oh my God, this is bad.’ But at the same time, I remember talking with Pat and the O-Line, and we were like ‘okay, we haven’t done anything wrong’, I felt like it was really different, the mindset.”
It allowed them to remain confident through the adversity.
“When we got back on the field, after that huge (58-yard kickoff return by Mecole Hardman), and we scored on the twoplay drive, we just clicked,” said Duvernay-Tardif. “At that point, we went back to the sideline and everybody was like, ‘okay we’ve got this, they cannot compete with us.’
“Next drive, score again, and then there’s a (failed) fake punt (by Texans) and at that point, when we got good field position and scored again, it was like ‘okay, nobody can stop us.’
“That feeling in the huddle, to go drive after drive … it was not even a question (of being stopped). We were on the sideline and it was like, alright, let’s go put up another one.’ To score seven in a row, I don’t know if it’s a record or what, but it felt amazing. To go on the field, and whether we were starting on their 40 or backed up at our 15, it was like, ‘alright, let’s go score, no matter how many plays, we’re going to deliver.’
Can that feeling carry over against the Titans on Sunday? It should.
“Last week was last week, this week is another challenge, another defence,” cautioned Duvernay-Tardif. “Last week was a pretty good defence too, but I feel like our chemistry is now stronger as a team because we experienced that in a critical situation, where we were able to rally together.