Redblacks hold off Alouettes for season-opening win
Visitors overcome Burris’s shaky first half for the team’s first road victory
MONTREAL — Hey, Ottawa fans! Your Canadian Football League team is in first place!
Yes, it’s just one game into the season, but remember this: The Redblacks won only two games all of last season, and it took them 18 tries to get even that many.
They’re 1-for-1 this year, though, after rallying to beat the Montreal Alouettes 20-16 at Molson Stadium on Thursday night.
“It’s great to win right now. It’s a great feeling,” said defensive back Abdul Kanneh, who played a key role in the result with hits that knocked at least one Alouettes quarterback out of the game and maybe helped send a second to the sidelines.
“But, at the end of the day, we still know we have a bigger task at hand,” Kanneh added. “Right now we are 1-0. After tonight we’ll be 1-0. Tomorrow, we’re 0-0. We taking each game one game at a time. We are not looking forward, we are now looking down the road. We are taking each team as it comes. Next is B.C.”
Those would be the B.C. Lions, who will provide the opposition in the Redblacks’ home opener on July 4 at TD Place stadium.
The Redblacks didn’t lead at all until early in the fourth quarter.
An interception by Jovon Johnson against rookie Alouettes quarterback Brandon Bridge — who was thrust into action after Jonathan Crompton (right shoulder) and Dan LeFevour (left shoulder) were both forced to the sidelines — set up a drive that was capped by a sixyard scoring run by Jeremiah Johnson.
There was still time on the clock, but the Bridge-led Alouettes couldn’t find a way to close the gap. They last had the ball with slightly less than four minutes remaining on the clock, but had to punt and never got it back.
That was different, too. The 2014, first-edition Redblacks wouldn’t have found a way to close out a contest, and indeed four innovative ways to give some away. That team never won on the road, either.
On Thursday, though, they found a way to win.
Henry Burris, who had not looked good in throwing three first-half interceptions, connected with new wideout Chris Williams for a key first-down completion to the 20-yard line.
Two more passes to Brad Sinopoli and runs by Chevon Walker and Burris drained the rest of the available time.
“We have a will to win on this team,” Burris said. “Nobody panicked. We believe, and it was big to see us go out and then close out that game and run that clock down there in the final minutes.”
It didn’t take long for the Alouettes to take the lead on Thursday, marching 65 yards in seven plays on their first offensive series, capped by Tyrell Sutton’s five-yard run through a mass of bodies and attempted tackles.
The good news for the visitors was that rookie Alouettes kicker Boris Bede subsequently missed the 32-yard convert attempt, leaving the score at 6-0.
The Redblacks responded with a drive into scoring position, but Delbert Alvarado’s 36-yard attempt was blocked, and it was only in the second quarter that Alvarado made a 40-yarder to get the visitors on the scoreboard.
The Alouettes conceded a safety after getting pinned deep in their end to start the next drive, which reduced their lead to 6-5, but Burris’s second interception set them up again on offence and eventually a blown defensive assignment by the Redblacks left fullback Jean-Christophe Beaulieu wide open to catch a four-yard touchdown pass from Crompton. Bede made this convert, so it was 13-5 going into halftime.
The game took a stunning turn early in the third quarter.
LeFevour entered the game at quarterback for the Alouettes, who announced that Crompton was being held out for “precautionary” reasons after hurting a shoulder.
He had been knocked around quite a bit, but the most violent collision was a double whammy from a blitzing Kanneh and defensive end Justin Capicciotti.