CFL East/West Final Predictions

Well, I’m not going to lie – I literally couldn’t fall asleep last night because I am so excited for this Sunday’s CFL Playoff games, I was still tossing and turning at 4 a.m. playing all of the different scenarios through my head. One thing I concluded despite my insomnia was that the 4 best teams in the CFL are playing this weekend, which is the way it should be.

The only “upset” last weekend was the Hamilton Ti-Cats losing to the BC Lions. The Tabbies were in a situation they hadn’t been in since about 2003 and that’s in the role of the favourite. I’ll admit I was pulling for Hamilton all the way and I think it’s unfortunate that they lost. They did make some huge strides this year though and they’ll have an interesting situation in camp deciding between Quarterbacks Quinton Porter, who was the original starter for the Ti-Cats this year before being benched by CFL Veteran Kevin Glenn who re-ignited the Tabbies offence. Personally, I stick with Glenn – he showed he still has what it takes and when he calls it quits you can hand Porter the reigns.

As far as the Lions go – I think they could give Montreal a run for their money, I’ll get into that more later though.

GAME 1: British Columbia Lions (8-10) Vs. Montreal Alouettes (15-3)
This is going to be a lot closer game than the two teams records indicate. Montreal has been the beast of the East (and the entire CFL for that matter) all season long. In fact, Marc Trestman’s record of 15-3 this year will tie for 2nd place in the “Most Regular Season Wins” category (1st is the 1990 Edmonton Eskimos with a record of 16-2). The Als and Lions have played each other tough all season and there’s no reason why this Sunday’s game should be any different. BC went 1-1 against the Al’s this season and this is the ultimate Rubber Match with a berth to the 97th Grey Cup at stake.

The Alouette’s have offensive superiority over the Leo’s led by Western Most Outstanding Player Candidate Anthony Calvillo at the trigger and all-purpose back and CFL All-Star Avon Cobourne in the backfield. The Amazing thing about the Alouette’s offense is how everyone gets so caught up with the personnel and not the amazing system that Marc Trestman has created there. The Alouettes have 3 Quarterbacks that have taken snaps at some point this season, Calvillo, Adrian McPherson, and Chris Leak – All 3 have a QB rating over 100 and a combined completion percentage of 70.9 which is nothing short of unbelievable.

The BC Lions have Casey Printers as their starting pivot for the time being. The Hamilton cast-off has been the Lions starter for only 4 games this season but has proven that he can still get the job done despite his struggles in Hamilton. Printers was knocked out of a game a couple weeks ago with a injury to his thumb on his throwing hand but all indications point towards that injury being healed up.

In the end, the Lions will keep this one close but the Alouettes are too good not to be in the Grey Cup this year.

MY PICK: Montreal

GAME 2: Calgary Stampeders (10-7-1) Vs. Saskatchewan Roughriders (10-7-1)

This is the game that kept me tossing and turning last night. When you look at it from the angle that the Stampeders are 0-2-1 against the Riders this season and the odds are that the Stamps are due for a win it definitely worries me. Not very often in Proffesional Sports do two teams that are so evenly matched go winless against the other in 4 games, the odds of it happening in fact are probably astronomical. The good news is that odds, statistics, and previous games have absolutely zero bearing on Sunday afternoon’s clash in Mosaic Stadium at Taylor Field.

The Stampeders will likely look to get Joffery Reynolds established early and often. I expect the West Nominee for Most Outstanding Player to have a heavy workload on Sunday with the hopes the Stamps can piggy-back on Reynolds and grind their way to the Grey Cup in their own backyard at McMahon. The dangerous thing about when Joffery gets established is they start to run that zone read play. Basically Burris takes the snap in Shotgun with Joffery to his side. Joffery goes to receive the hand off while Burris sticks the ball in Joffery’s gut, Burris keeps his hands on the ball and reads the Defensive End, if the DE crashes down and loses contain while trying to make a tackle on Joffery Burris will simply pull the ball back out of Joffery’s hands and bootleg around to the outside. Edmonton had a great deal of trouble stopping this play but it really isn’t that difficult to stop in theory. If you make sure you don’t bite down and collapse on the run as a Defensive End and keep contain Burris will be forced to hand the ball off to Joffery every time – hopefully you can rely on your DT’s and Linebackers to limit Reynolds’ gains.

As for the Riders, they’re going to have to have long, sustained drives on offence and make sure they don’t turn the ball over. The less time the Stamp’s offence is on the field the better chance the Riders will win this game. Darian Durant has had great sucess against a Stampeders defence that loves to play man-to-man. Durant, no doubt, will have some butterflies going into this game and he will be a major factor in the final result of the football game. If Durant has nerves he’ll have to get over them quickly if the Riders hope to advance to the Grey Cup on November 29th in Calgary.

MY PICK: Saskatchewan

So there you go, you heard it here first folks. The 97th Grey Cup will be the Montreal Alouettes Vs. Saskatchewan Roughriders.