Ticats at Lions postgame stats and comments

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B.C.FAN
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Qman wrote:PASSING
PLAYER CP/AT % YDS TD INT LG
JENNINGS, Jonathon 20/32 62.5% 306 3 1 38

RUSHING
PLAYER CAR YDS AVG LG TD
JOHNSON, Jeremiah 15 62 4.1 20 2
JENNINGS, Jonathon 3 24 8.0 14 0
MURRAY-LAWRENCE, Shaquille 1 1 1.0 1 0

RECEIVING
PLAYER REC YDS AVG LG TD
ARCENEAUX, Emmanuel 5 105 21.0 35 2
BURNHAM, Bryan 2 71 35.5 38 1
GORE, Shawn 6 63 10.5 25 0
BOLDEWIJN, Geraldo 3 32 10.7 15 0
IANNUZZI, Marco 2 18 9.0 15 0
RAINEY, Chris 1 9 9.0 9 0
LUMBALA, Rolly 1 8 8.0 8 0

FIELD GOALS
PLAYER FGA FG LG S YDS FG MISS
LEONE, Richie 2 1 27 0 27 37

PUNT RETURNS
PLAYER NO YDS AVG LG TD
RAINEY, Chris 1 40 40.0 40 0
IANNUZZI, Marco 2 16 8.0 13 0

KICKOFF RETURNS
PLAYER NO YDS AVG LG TD
IANNUZZI, Marco 5 104 20.8 31 0
RAINEY, Chris 3 55 18.3 24 0

PUNTING
PLAYER NO YDS AVG LG S NET AVG
LEONE, Richie 7 437 62.4 78 2 326 46.6

KICKOFFS
PLAYER NO YDS AVG LG S
LEONE, Richie 7 447 63.9 68 0

DEFENCE
PLAYER DT ST QS INT FR FF
BIGHILL, Adam 7 0 1 1 0 0
ELIMIMIAN, Solomon 5 0 1 0 0 0
PHILLIPS, Ryan 4 0 0 0 0 0
CLARKE, Steven 4 1 1 0 1 0
TURNER, Bryant 2 0 0 0 0 0
BAZZIE, Alex 2 0 0 0 0 0
WESTERMAN, Jabar 2 0 1 0 0 0
THOMPSON, Anthony 2 0 0 0 0 0
IANNUZZI, Marco 1 0 0 0 0 0
EDEM, Mike 1 0 0 0 0 0
LOKOMBO, Bo 1 0 0 0 0 0
PURIFOY, Loucheiz 1 0 1 0 0 1
FORDE, Maxx 1 0 0 0 0 0
YELL, Ronnie 1 0 0 0 0 0
ARAKGI, Jason 1 3 0 0 0 0
JOHNSON, Jeremiah 0 0 0 0 1 0
FRASER, Eric 0 1 0 0 0 0
STEWART, Brandon 0 1 0 0 0 0
BENSON, Mike 0 1 0 0 0 0
PARKER, Keynan 0 1 0 0 0 0
ONTKO, Cameron 0 1 0 0 0 0
It was a game of two halves. The Lions came out attacking, sacked a rusty Zach Collaros five times and built up a 32-12 halftime lead but the Ticats wouldn't quit. They sent more pressure, jumped routes and capitalized with a long INT that turned the tables, narrowed the score to 32-19 and sent the Lions into a funk for most of the second half. Jonathon Jennings was afraid to take risks and the coaches called a conservative game on offence and defence, allowing the Ticats to steal momentum and claw away at the lead.

Zach Collaros had plenty of time in the second half and ate up the Lions' passive two-deep zone coverage, lobbing passes into intermediate routes in front of flat-footed safeties Mike Edem and Anthony Thompson and, one one TD, a confused Bo Lokombo. An INT by Adam Bighill playing deep in the same cover-2 defence gave the Lions their only spark until the final series of the second half, when Jennings was allowed to return to his natural unslinging role and kept the Ticats off balance by throwing short to Gore and Arceneaux and running for first downs when he got outside of containment.

Kudos to Jennings and Arceneaux for stepping up when the game was on the line, and to the fans for keeping up the raucous atmosphere right to the final Hamilton series. It was a good win and hopefully reinforced the message to the players that no lead is safe, and that the best way to defend is to attack, even with a big lead.
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B.C.FAN
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Another stat that should be mentioned is that Richie Leone punted seven times for an average of 62.4 yards and a net of 46.6 yards. A couple of long punts bounced into the end zone for singles but anything that prevents Brandon Banks from breaking the game open is good. Leone's only mistake of the night was his missed 37-yard field goal attempt that produced an 11-point swing when Banks returned it 126 yards for a TD. Instead of an 11-point B.C. lead with four minutes left, Hamilton tied the game on the ensuing two-point convert.
TheLionKing
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Rainey's spectacular return was called back by a questionable penalty.
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David
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Refs need to display much better discretion on these calls that don't affect the play.

Yes, it's a hard job to officiate a CFL game and yes, the players make some dumb mistakes that can't be ignored, like jumping offsides and facemasking etc. But the game times could be greatly reduced if the referees just call the obvious infractions and ignore the marginal ones that have absolutely no bearing.


DH :cool:
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Rammer
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TheLionKing wrote:Rainey's spectacular return was called back by a questionable penalty.
What a call. Refs should be fined as well for calls that they seem to be looking to call or worse yet ignore all the no yards call late in the game. Combine that with an over zealous call of no yards s BC earlier in the game and you have a net of 30 yards that the refs cost the Lions. The non call affected the Lions field position forcing a longer Leone FG attempt that became the miss that Banks ran back for the TD, s game changer. Not sure how out was missed either as the ref was at most 5 yards away from the ball directly between Iannuzzi and the Hamilton player who was 3 yards away from Iannuzzi's catch.

Wally should have challenged both plays, but that isn't one of Wally's strengths, something he should defer to an a booth coach.
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DanoT
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Rammer wrote:
TheLionKing wrote:Rainey's spectacular return was called back by a questionable penalty.
What a call. Refs should be fined as well for calls that they seem to be looking to call or worse yet ignore all the no yards call late in the game. Combine that with an over zealous call of no yards s BC earlier in the game and you have a net of 30 yards that the refs cost the Lions. The non call affected the Lions field position forcing a longer Leone FG attempt that became the miss that Banks ran back for the TD, s game changer. Not sure how out was missed either as the ref was at most 5 yards away from the ball directly between Iannuzzi and the Hamilton player who was 3 yards away from Iannuzzi's catch.

Wally should have challenged both plays, but that isn't one of Wally's strengths, something he should defer to an a booth coach.
At the time of that non No Yards call I wondered if the ref who was standing right there was one of those American refs who might have had a brain fart with the CFL rules. Of course there is a provision for the Command Centre or in house official to intervene on a mistaken call or non call but those guys appear to have a lot more brain problems than farts. :bang:

And that bogus illegal block penalty on Lokumbo on Rainy's TD kick return...It was clearly visible on TV as it was happening live that the Stamp player turner his back to the blocker (Lokumbo) just as the block was about to be made. That would have been a bad call for a high school ref to make. :bang:
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Our Leos won an exciting football game that went down to the wire as our Leos prevailed 45-38. I was exhausted, as well as exhilarated by game end. Here are some post game thoughts.

When Manny Arsenault made his impressive catch and run into the end zone, with 1:23 remaining in the game everyone in the building sensed that it was going to go down to the wire or overtime and it did. Collaras made a bad throw on third down, the football bounded off Edem's brick hands to the ground, and our Leos were 5-2.

Here are some post game thoughts:

OFFENCE

Our offence quickly exploited our first defensive turnover of the game, a Collaras fumble, created by Purifoy and recoverd by Stephen Clarke, into 6 points as Jennings hit Burnham deep for a 38 yard touchdown. A Jeremiah Johnson on the convert gave us an 8 point lead.

With a 9-6 lead, Rainey ran a punt back for a touchdown that was negated by a Lokombo penalty but the yardage put our Leos in good field position. Johnson completed the drive with a touchdown run and our Leos were up 16-6. Up 18-6, after a Hamilton safety, Jennings picked apart the Tiger Cats defence. Jennings then threw a purrfect deep ball to Arseneaux, who went up high for another Leos touchdown to put our Leos up 25-6.

Our Leos offence began another second quarter drive, now up 25-12, after a Masoli short yardage touchdown. Jennings hit Burnham for a 33-yard pass reception, completed another pass to Arseneaux, and Johnson ran the footall in again to give us a 32-12 half time lead.

The marque match of the week was looking like a Leos blowout. But Hamilton, needing to take chances, brought the blitz in the second half and we had no answers. In the third quarter, Jennings threw an out that was picked off by Emanuel Davis and his long return led to a Hamilton touchdown. The play was a momentum changer. Jennings should not have thrown the football but Iannuzzi badly tipped off the pass play and Davis undercut the route. Tasker would complete the drive with a touchdown pass reception. Hamilton then scored another field goal but all looked good again when Bighill picked off a Collaras throw and we kicked another field goal.

But our offence remained bogged down. Jennings looked anything but confident, our play calling was dismal in combatting the Hamilton blitz, and the Ticats had come back to tie the game on Toliver's 31 yard touchdown reception and Brandon Banks 126 yard run off a Leone missed field goal.

As Leone placed the tee for his field goal attempt, I said to my friend beside me, if Leone hits this field goal, we should win this game but if he misses, Banks is back there and I'm very worried. It turned out to be prophetic. Leone missed it to the wide side of the field and with 3:11 left in the game and with the score now tied, our offence took over the football. Hamilton had outscored us 25-6 In the second half at that point.

We badly needed a drive and we got it, as Jennings came alive at crunch time and Arseneaux also took the game on his back on a 72 yard touchdown drive.

Arseneaux had 5 catches for 105 yds and Gore had 6 catches for 63 yards to lead our receiving core.

But the second half also showed weaknesses in our offence. We did not have a good game plan for the Hamilton blitz. We don't screen, bubble screen, or have a lot of hot read plays, or quick throw anti-blitz plays. We basically put it all on Jennings. Our running game was also shut down for most of the second half. Johnson had no holes and began to run laterally. Putting in a cold Murray-Lawrence for a running play didn't help.

DEFENCE

Our defense came out fired up for this game. Purifoy's tackle on Collaras, causing a fumble, led to our first touchdown. We brought a lot of different blitzes against Hamilton in the first half and had 5 sacks. It wasn't that Collaras was rusty as much as it was our defensive pressure that was the key to our defense in the first half.

But our defence had to deal with a lot of adversity in the second half. Davis's interception gave Hamilton the football deep in our red zone. Adam Bighill's interception and return was huge in the fourth quarter but it would not be enough. Banks 124 yard touchdown return forced our defense to have to hold Hamilton's offence from scoring a touchdown late in the game. Hamilton moved the football downfield but we forced them into a third and short and Hamilton was unable to convert the play.

Stephen Clarke had another impressive game at boundary half back. He made a big hit on Tasker. He blitzes very well too. Bighill played very well in this game, with 7 tackles, a sack, and an excellent read interception and very good return run off it.

Our offensive ineptitude in the third quarter and for most of the fourth quarter certainly did not help our defence. But we also went way too conservative in the second half. We rarely blitzed, going mostly with four and three man fronts. We played two deep zone. We gave Collaras time to thorw the football in the second half and that is a recipe for problems.

It took a 72 yard winning, purrfect drive and a third down stop to win a game that we should have won going away.

SPECIAL TEAMS

Leone had a tremendous game punting the football. He averaged 62.4 yds. per punt. He hit his field goals and converts until his final field goal attempt of the game. Missing it to the wide side, when he could have sealed the football game, turned into a disaster with Banks back there. The field goal attempt should have been a chip shot had Wally challenged a no call for no yards.

Rainey returned a punt for a touchdown that was nullified by a penalty although he did get a lot of yards gained on the play. Iannuzzi had an excellent game as a returner. Jason Aragki tied a CFL record for downfield tackles on special teams.

WRAP

Our Lions are 5-2 and will play Calgary for 1st place in the West next Friday. Brooks should be back and we missed him playing beside Westerman or in the nose tackle spot.

This game showed that we need to make improvements. Our running game blocking needs work. We need more variety in our running attack other than running the inside zone read play. We need to expand our play book to add in some higher percentage plays against the blitz.

Defensively, we need to learn that we play best when we continue to play aggressively with a lead. Dropping 8 and 9 defenders into coverage consistently, while giving a quarterback time to throw is not a successful recipe against good quarterbacks. We have to mix it up more, as we did in the first half of this game.

Wally needs to deal with his challenge calls. They are hurting us. He has never been a good game manager and he needs to develop a better system for challenge calls.

We had a 20 point lead at the half (32-12) and we led 35-22 to start the 4th quarter. As in the last Calgary game, we made the same kind of mistakes. We threw an interception at the wrong time. We began to play too conservatively. This time we prevailed but we need to learn from the experiences.

Its been exciting so far this season and there is a lot to be thankful for in watching our Leos. But games like this are too hard on the heart.
"When I went to Catholic high school in Philadelphia, we just had one coach for football and basketball. He took all of us who turned out and had us run through a forest. The ones who ran into the trees were on the football team". (George Raveling)
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1 Playing safe to protect a lead is a good way to lose.

2 We need better QB protection schemes. Jennings does it on his own at times.

3 Soft zone in attempting to protect a lead is slow death.

4 We need better run blocking.

5 Need ST coach to figure out a way to cover Banks or Williams on long missed FGs. Smaller faster cover unit is no doubt needed.

Wally's old conservative habits, which served him so well for so long, almost cost us the game. IMO ...

Great CFL barn burner. Two young gunslingers.

The problem with a conservative approach is that it can even tighten up a gunslinger like Jennings.

Great team spirit and morale on the Lions.

Any doubters still out there about Jennings?

PLAY TO WIN.

DO NOT GO INTO A SHELL, WITH SOFT ZONE D, AND CONSERVATIVE O, HOPING AND PRAYING TO PROTECT A LEAD.

THE OTHER TEAM WILL BE IN ATTACK MODE IN THEIR COMEBACK.

This is a matter of your football philosophy on both O and D. You have to get after a QB like Collaros. You have to atrack on O, or the QB and players will tighten up.
John Madden's Team Policies: Be on time. Pay attention. Play like hell on game day.

Jimmy Johnson's Game Keys: Protect the ball. Make plays.

Walter Payton's Advice to Kids: Play hard. Play fair. Have fun.
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DanoT
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It was a nervous second half, made worse by the Lions refusal to move the pocket. Some of Jennings best play including Manny's game winning TD occurred when Jennings was forced out of the pocket.

A few more designed running plays for Jennings, please. The TSN guys commented on how fast he was and how the safety took the wrong angle on one run.

Nice to at least see Rolly in there as a blocking FB, but I would have preferred to see more TE alignments.
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The Banks return was impressive, he pretty much had 2/3rds of the field to run towards and outran all the Lions that were coming down field. He was past half the team by the 25 yard line. I did think that one of the Lions (it might have been Lulay coming laterally towards the sidelines) was held and eventually tackled to the ground around our 45-50 yard line, preventing him from getting across the field to push Banks over the sideline. I was very clear to people in our section who were protesting the lack of a call and then when the replay was shown, were calling for Wally to challenge the call.... He looked like he might challenge, but did not.

Maybe holding isn't challengeable in this instance??? I dunno, but I did think that it was a pretty clear case of holding (more than the Lokombo call). Did anyone see that? Is it a challenge play?
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B.C.FAN
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Dusty wrote:The Banks return was impressive, he pretty much had 2/3rds of the field to run towards and outran all the Lions that were coming down field. He was past half the team by the 25 yard line. I did think that one of the Lions (it might have been Lulay coming laterally towards the sidelines) was held and eventually tackled to the ground around our 45-50 yard line, preventing him from getting across the field to push Banks over the sideline. I was very clear to people in our section who were protesting the lack of a call and then when the replay was shown, were calling for Wally to challenge the call.... He looked like he might challenge, but did not.

Maybe holding isn't challengeable in this instance??? I dunno, but I did think that it was a pretty clear case of holding (more than the Lokombo call). Did anyone see that? Is it a challenge play?
I saw it and thought it should have been a penalty (certainly more than Lokombo's illegal block penalty on Rainey's punt return) but holding is not challengeable.
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B.C.FAN wrote:
It was a game of two halves. The Lions came out attacking, sacked a rusty Zach Collaros five times and built up a 32-12 halftime lead but the Ticats wouldn't quit. They sent more pressure, jumped routes and capitalized with a long INT that turned the tables, narrowed the score to 32-19 and sent the Lions into a funk for most of the second half. Jonathon Jennings was afraid to take risks and the coaches called a conservative game on offence and defence, allowing the Ticats to steal momentum and claw away at the lead.
Orlando Steinhauer was loading up the box, and rushing five, six, or seven players, on almost every down from the middle of the second quarter onwards. The result was that
Jennings did not have time to set up in the pocket and throw deep as he had been able to do earlier in the game. In the second quarter, he took a couple of hellacious hits
from Tiger-Cat linemen, and looked very tentative for most of the remainder of the game. Khari Jones did not help Jennings by calling plays designed to beat the blitz, such
as shovel and swing passes to Johnson or Rainey, or by rolling Jennings out (until the final touchdown play of the game). IMO, the story of the second half was that the
Tiger-Cats defence changed their approach, and the Lions' offence did not respond until very late in the game.


B.C.FAN wrote:Zach Collaros had plenty of time in the second half and ate up the Lions' passive two-deep zone coverage, lobbing passes into intermediate routes in front of flat-footed safeties Mike Edem and Anthony Thompson and, one one TD, a confused Bo Lokombo.
The Lions defence had five sacks in the first half, and, even though he had some success, Collaros looked uncertain and skittish on many occasions. For reasons that
I cannot understand, Washington rushed either three or four on EVERY down in the second half, giving Collaros time to settle in, find his receivers, and gain confidence.
Even though the Lions usually had eight or nine back in coverage, the Tiger-Cat receivers are an excellent and experienced group, and they were able to consistently
find the holes. Washington didn't need to send extra rushers on every down, but he needed to give Collaros different looks as he had done in the first half. The Lions'
defence played hard, and I thought that the secondary covered and tackled very well. But allowing Callaros to stand in the pocket without pressure was asking for
trouble.

B.C.FAN wrote:Kudos to Jennings and Arceneaux for stepping up when the game was on the line, and to the fans for keeping up the raucous atmosphere right to the final Hamilton series. It was a good win and hopefully reinforced the message to the players that no lead is safe, and that the best way to defend is to attack, even with a big lead.
IIRC, Jennings only rolled out once by design in the whole game, and that lead to the second touchdown pass to Arceneaux. He had a receiver with him to the outside,
and could also have run for a decent gain. The Tiger-Cat secondary had to flow with Jennings, leaving the middle of the field wide open for Arceneaux. Why Jones
doesn't roll Jennings out more often, especially to escape pressure, is incomprehensible to me.
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Excellent analyses, B.C.FAN and Blitz. An exciting game for sure, but shouldn't have had the nail-biting finish. It's hard to understand MW's lack of pressure on Collaros in the 2nd half when it had worked so well in the first half. I had thought that it had become fully-accepted that playing cautiously in order to maintain a lead was bad strategy, but evidently not. And, of course, it wasn't just the D that went ultra-conservative in the second half; the O seemed to also have lost its bounce and effort. It's great to get the win, but I didn't come away from the game feeling that the Leos were developing into a dominant team.

Attendance was reported as 21,213--a Whitecaps-size crowd. Speaking of attendance, the Lions have averaged only 20,506 reported customers in their first three home games in 2016, with one game (the Thursday nighter against Toronto) attracting only 18,921. The Argos don't seem to be doing well either in their new digs, BMO field. They're averaging 17,074 over four home games, with one crowd on only 12,373. The new stadium is reported to hold 26,500 for football and 30,200 for soccer and rugby. Not sure why the capacity would be less for football. I wonder whether attendance is down all through the league so far in 2016.
zeppo
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DanoT wrote:

And that bogus illegal block penalty on Lokumbo on Rainy's TD kick return...It was clearly visible on TV as it was happening live that the Stamp player turner his back to the blocker (Lokumbo) just as the block was about to be made. That would have been a bad call for a high school ref to make. :bang:
I had a good view of that block, and, IMO, Lokumbo needed to play a lot smarter. Initially, he hit the Tiger-Cat defender on the side, which was all that
was necessary to eliminate him from the play. However, as the Tiger-Cat player stumbled and turned, Lokumbo continued with the block and pushed
him down from behind. Now, I totally understand the argument that Rainey had already gone past, and that the illegal part of the block did not
influence the final outcome of the play. However, players on the special teams should be cognizant of the number of penalties that are called on
kick/punt returns in the CFL, and refrain from any contact that a referee could interpret as holding or "blocking from the rear".

It is worth mentioning that Lokumbo was also penalized for a flagrant holding call on a kick return in the fourth quarter. I understand
that he was trying hard, but he needed to be smarter on both occasions.
zeppo
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B.C.FAN wrote:Another stat that should be mentioned is that Richie Leone punted seven times for an average of 62.4 yards and a net of 46.6 yards. A couple of long punts bounced into the end zone for singles but anything that prevents Brandon Banks from breaking the game open is good. Leone's only mistake of the night was his missed 37-yard field goal attempt that produced an 11-point swing when Banks returned it 126 yards for a TD. Instead of an 11-point B.C. lead with four minutes left, Hamilton tied the game on the ensuing two-point convert.
Yes, missing that field goal was a "killer", and could have cost the Lions the game. Professional kickers need to be automatic from 37 yards.
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