HAMMER DOWN
Esks squeak past Ticats
The rich got richer and the poor got poorer in the CFL Thursday. The Hamilton Tiger-Cats looked on pace for their first victory of the season against the last undefeated team of 2017. But the Edmonton Eskimos pulled out another close victory in the dying seconds, winning 31-28 to improve to 4-0 for the first time since 2014, in front of a sellout crowd of 23,531 at Tim Hortons Field. The Ticats, meanwhile, fell to 0-4 for the first time since 2007, back when Edmonton head coach Jason Maas was the starting quarterback in Hamilton. Trailing 28-23 with 70 seconds remaining, the Eskimos put together a five-play, 75-yard drive that featured a 30-yard catch by Vidal Hazelton to get into Hamilton territory, a 20-yard grab by Brandon Zylstra to reach the red zone and a 15-yard touchdown reception to cap it by Hazelton, who came up with a ball that appeared to be in the hands of defensive back Justin Rogers. It gave the Eskimos their first and only lead of the game, after trailing 25-13 after three quarters. “I knew it wasn’t going to be easy and our guys made some great plays,” Eskimos quarterback Mike Reilly said. “I don’t even think we got into a third-down situation, we played fast, Vidal had some great catch-and-runs, Zylstra had a big-time catch and there was still enough time on the clock where we were comfortable with running the ball a few times, too. “We know a minute-plus in the CFL is forever, really. And that’s the great part about this season so far is that’s not our first time being in a similar scenario.” Reilly completed 27 of 37 passes for 350 yards and three touchdowns, stretching his interception-free streak to his last 205 pass attempts. Zach Collaros went 22 of 36 for 249 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions in the losing effort. Zylstra recorded his third 100yard game of the season with 12 catches for 113 yards, while Bryant Mitchell caught five for 76 yards and his first CFL touchdown playing in place of slotback Adarius Bowman, who went on the sixgame injured list with a bad hamstring. Cory Watson had three catches for 44 yards and recorded his first touchdown of the season. Seven of the last eight meetings between the Eskimos and Ticats have now come down to the last three minutes and have all been decided by a touchdown or less. The Eskimos have won all four of their games this year by a combined 12 points. “It seems to be something that’s going to happen to us the first four games of the year, I guess. We’ve come out on the better end of them, we’re used to this,” Maas said. “We have a lot of fight in our lockerroom and that’s the reason. We have a lot of character, a lot of fight. “We didn’t play well enough early in the game, had a punt block for a touchdown, had a lot of adversity. We just kept grinding, kept fighting and guys made plays at the end to pull it out.” After taking an 8-0 lead on two field goals and a safety concession, the Ticats took a 15-13 lead into halftime on a two-yard touchdown pass to Luke Tasker, while the Eskimos responded with a 29-yard touchdown reception by Mitchell and a two-yard plunge by running back Travon Van. The third quarter opened with Terrell Davis blocking a Sean Whyte punt, which was recovered by Geoff Hughes for a six-yard touchdown return to put Hamilton ahead 22-13. Sergio Castillo hit his third of four field goals on the night to sit at a perfect nine for nine on the season, pushing the lead to 12 points before Watson’s 34-yard touchdown catch was followed up by Sean Whyte’s only field goal attempt of the night, from 40 yards, to trail 25-23 and set up the lastminute dramatics.