The play a season can turn on
It was kind of a hinge play. Which way was this door going to swing?
Both ways as it turned out, but eventually much more in the favour the home side, which is why Alex Green’s fumble, brutally costly at the time, just might turn out to be a pivotal moment in the Hamilton TigerCats’ 2018 season.
The key element wasn’t the fumble itself, of course, but the player’s and his teammates’ long-view response to it.
The Tiger-Cats, who had led 14-0 before giving up a pair of second-quarter Labour Day touchdowns to the Toronto Argonauts, had regained equilibrium with a rhythmic 106-yard touchdown drive — initiated by Green’s relentlessly insistent 11-yard gain from his own fouryard-line — to conclude the first half.
But after Jeremiah Masoli had deftly marched the Ticats 74 yards to the Argonauts 10-yardline on the opening sequence of the second half, while you were smelling a big-margin victory in the making, Green was hit with perfect timing by Toronto’s Ronnie Yell. Alden Darby, who had an earlier interception, scooped up the loose ball and sucked the humid air right out of Tim Hortons Field with every step of his 100-yard game-tying touchdown.
The Argos went ahead by seven points after their next drive and suddenly Big Mo was driving a double blue bus.
Hamilton managed only two offensive plays separating those Toronto scoring thrusts, but the first was significant: a hand-off to the guy who had just fumbled. It went only three yards on the ground, but went a long way in the head. Trust isn’t something you talk about, you demonstrate it.
The first play after Toronto’s go-ahead touchdown also went to Green: a short pass that he carried for 20 yards, setting up the first of Lirim Hajrullahu’s two field goals.
Soon after Mike Daly’s great read and subsequent interception Green ran a draw 19 yards for the go-ahead, and stay-ahead, touchdown.
But he wasn’t done yet: he made nine yards on first down to help keep the insurance touchdown drive moving. And he chewed up 30 yards and two full minutes on five consecutive carries late in the 42-28 victory, as the Ticats ate the clock and, once again, Toronto’s Labour Day lunch.
The Ticat offensive engine runs most smoothly with Green, backed up Mercer Timmis, frequently applying the oil. And he’s in a big-time groove, that fumble notwithstanding.
On the larger scale, if the understandable emotional letdown immediately following the 100-yard fumble return had persisted and morphed into a Ticat Labour Day loss what would the local football landscape have looked like today?
The Ticats would be tied with the Argos for second place, two games back of Ottawa, and one down in the season tiebreaker. As a western playoff cross-over rears its usual ugly head, this Saturday’s rematch at BMO Field would then have been on the cusp of must-win status, with the Ticats coming off a deflating loss to their lifelong rivals.
But instead, the Ticats showed the collective memory of relief pitchers, shrugging off that setback as they did the earlier disappearance of their 14-0 lead. By scoring on all four of their possessions (field goal, field goal, touchdown, touchdown) after they fell behind 28-21, and allowing Toronto just one first down over the final 19 minutes, the Ticats mined not just a win, but a lode of self-belief. They are back to .500, have won three of four and two straight at home.
Saturday is still a huge day, but from a much more positive Hamilton viewpoint. Should the Ticats win they’ll put Toronto three games in arrears, and own the tiebreaker, so that over the final seven games, in order to pass Hamilton the Argos would have to win four more games than the Ticats do. And Ticats fans could feel free to think much more about first place than second or third.
Teams want to have better results as it gets later in the season, just as they want to have better results as it gets later in the game. Right now, the Ticats are heading in the right direction on both counts. The confident manner in which they recovered from a devastating fumble return and a few other Labour Day road bumps may be overshadowed by what is still to come, but it might also be reflected upon as the response that gave a team its identity.
NOTES: The Tiger-Cats didn’t practise Tuesday and no official update was available on the injuries which took wide receiver Jalen Saunders (knee) and cornerback Delvin Breaux (head) out of the game ... After averaging just below five points per fourth quarter over their first eight games, the Tiger-Cats have combined for 30 in their home wins over Edmonton (12) and Toronto (18) . ... Prior to this year, Luke Tasker’s career-high for receiving yards in one game was 146. In the past two games, he has 156 and 143.