Call this year’s Grey Cup the Double Drought Bowl

CALGARY — On Thursday of Grey Cup week, the fans show up, wearing their colours and costumes, heading to the streets and watering holes to commit hoopla.

Here this year, however, watching the hopeful fans from Winnipeg and Hamilton arrive has been worthy of a psychological study.

How high do they dare to let their hopes get?

Grey Cup 107 is the Double Drought Bowl.

For the Hamilton TigerCats, it’s been 20 years since they previously hoisted the Cup. For the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, it’s been 29.

Of the Bombers’ 46-man roster for last weekend’s West final, 31 were not born when the blue and gold won it all in 1990.

But history also offers hope in Winnipeg, a.k.a. Loserpeg.

The two previous longest Grey Cup droughts in Bombers history ended with victories over Hamilton. One was a 17-season drought that ended in1958 when Bud Grant’s Bombers beat the Tiger-Cats 35-28. And a 22-year drought was wiped away in 1984 with another victory over Hamilton.

Senior citizens will remember the great Bombers Ticats classic Grey Cup classics in 1957, ’58, ’59, ’61, ’62 and ’65. Only once since then have they met in a Grey Cup game and that was in 1984.

The suffering of the fanbases of the two teams may be felt much more than the players. But the suffering is definitely shared by the two head coaches involved.

“I think as we consistently built this team from six years ago, the expectations have got much higher in Winnipeg and they should,” said Bombers’ Mike O’Shea.

For Hamilton, 1999 seems much more recent than Winnipeg’s 1990. Part of that is the fact that head coach Orlondo Steinauer played for that team. And that group was just celebrated this season.

“For us, it was made aware as we honoured Rob Hitchcock this year. He went up on our Wall of Honour. So there was a pretty good celebration for the 20-year reunion that brought attention to it,” said the coach.