Nine Ticats line up as all-stars

They may have underachieved as a team for nearly a month, but the Hamilton Tiger-Cats head into Sunday’s home playoff game against the B.C. Lions with the confidence and approval of allstar voters.

The Tiger-Cats collected nine spots on the 27-man CFL East Division all-star team, the most they’ve placed on the conference selects since 2014, and their second-highest total of the

21st Century.

Electrifying wide receiver Brandon Banks, now out for the season with a broken clavicle, and impact defensive tackle Ted Laurent were each named Wednesday as East all-stars for the fifth time. Banks, who had 11 touchdowns in just 14 games, was chosen as a receiver last year and as the special teams returner the three seasons before that.

Jeremiah Masoli’s selection over Ottawa’s Trevor Harris at quarterback was an indicator of not only his ability to generate hefty yardage despite an increasingly diminished receiving corps now missing four big-time members but of the likelihood he’ll be announced Thursday as the East’s candidate for the CFL’s Most Outstanding Player.

Hamilton placed four players — Masoli, Banks, fellow 11touchdown receiver Luke Tasker, and left guard Brandon Revenberg — on the offensive squad and five more on the defensive side: Laurent, linebackers Larry Dean and Don Unamba, and defensive backs Delvin Breaux and Cariel Brooks who play beside each other on the short side of the field.

Dean and Revenberg are solid candidates to represent the East in, respectively, the Most Outstanding Defensive Player and Most Outstanding Offensive Linemen categories.

It was the fourth eastern berth for Tasker, second for Dean and Breaux (who also made it in 2014, before heading to the NFL) and

the debut for Revenberg, Unamba, Brooks and Masoli.

The selections of two players who were in different positions this season than they were last year — boundary halfback Brooks and Unamba, who plays SAM linebacker, a hybrid of linebacker and defensive back — are reflections of how quickly the secondary came together after being considered the team’s biggest question mark in training camp.

“I would definitely say that I’m one of the underdogs, but I like it that way,” said Brooks, who had four interceptions, one short of the CFL leaders.

“I’ve been through so much in my professional career, so this is a real emotional thing for me. Being released from the NFL, then coming up to Toronto and being released, then Hamilton giving me the opportunity last year and playing so many different positions here.

“I finally caught my stride and found the position I can play. I like the boundary side. That’s me.”

According to team research, the Ticats’ largest divisional all-star contingent was 13 in 1986, when Hamilton won the Grey Cup. They had 11 in both 1989 and ’99 and reached the Grey Cup game both times, and 10 back in 2014, another Grey Cup appearance season. But one of those 2014 selections was barely a Ticat.

Running back Nic Grigsby joined the team for the final three games after scoring nine touchdowns for Winnipeg but was included on the eastern voters’ ballot.

Ottawa Redblacks led the East, and the entire CFL, with 11 allstar berths.

From one angle, the volume of all-star selections actually emphasizes the local disappointment in the Ticats’ 8-10 record, three games in arrears of the first-place Redblacks, who beat them all three times this year.

“Things happened, we dealt with some injuries,” offered Unamba, the former cornerback who was virtually speechless about his all-star nod at a position he had to ask to try out for during training camp.

“We gave up some games we shouldn’t have: we gave up a last-second game in B.C. a few weeks ago. You can’t be disappointed though. We still have a chance to be where we want to be, in the playoffs with a chance to go to the Grey Cup.”

Against the Lions on Sunday Masoli will start his first playoff game since, replacing injured Zach Collaros, he beat Toronto and nearly beat Ottawa in 2015, a season he started as No. 4 on the depth chart.

He threw for 5,209 yards and 28 touchdowns, against 18 interceptions this year and his 12 games of 300 or more passing yards set a franchise record and was the fourth-most in CFL history.

During Wednesday’s practice he was wearing a brace around the knee he hurt in Ottawa three weeks ago.

“I could definitely go without it,” he said. “Right now, it’s just a precautionary measure. “I’m good. It’s just the wear and tear of the season. Kind of an accumulation.”