The Canadian Football League is down to its final four. A rematch of last year’s East Final and a classic Western rivalry are giving us a lot to work with heading into the second last weekend of the season.
It was a nice 4-0 start to the playoffs last week, let’s look to keep the roll going.
Saturday, November 9: Toronto Argonauts at Montreal Alouettes — 3:00 p.m. EST
It is a rematch of last year’s East Final with the Toronto Argonauts facing the Montreal Alouettes but for this sequel, the teams are switching roles.
Last year, the Argos tried to flip the switch after not playing a meaningful game in a while against the Alouettes, who had to battle their way into the postseason. This year, Montreal had the East wrapped up with a few weeks to spare and there wasn’t much drama in that race at all this season. Meanwhile, the Argos needed a late surge to get their home playoff date before erupting against Ottawa in last week’s East Semi-Final.
You can easily explain away any of Montreal’s bad stats with the thought that they were unmotivated and not playing sharp. But, I think the problems are deeper than that.
A lot of things changed for Montreal all at once but the biggest was the injury to Tyson Philpot. The Canadian was following his unbelievable playoffs with an excellent season before he went down for the year with a foot injury. The injury came right at the halfway point of the season and the differences before and after are quite noticeable.
The team put up 25 points or more in six of the nine games they had Philpot in this year. They reached the 25-point total just three more times after his injury. Overall, the team scored over a touchdown less per game, averaging 21.5 points/game without him compared to 29 points/game with him. Cody Fajardo had over 250 passing yards in every game he played with Philpot, while only getting there once without him.
Overall, the Als went 8-1 with Philpot. Without him, it was 4-4-1. If you want to blame that on a lack of motivation or Fajardo working back into the line, you can but I really feel like that would be whistling past the graveyard. Philpot finished this season third on the team in receiving even after only playing half of the year. The offence hasn’t been able to replace him and it has been noticeable.
It will be tough for them to keep pace with an Argos offence that has scored 30+ points in every game except for one since Labour Day. Chad Kelly and company put up some gigantic numbers in the East Semi-Final against a struggling Redblacks defence.
Montreal’s defence has not suffered from the same struggles as their offence, but they did give up 287 yards to Kelly when these two teams played in Week 17. The other standout from that game was running back Ka’Deem Carey, going for 90 yards on 13 carries. Two of Carey’s three best games came against Montreal, who ended the year with the third-worst run defence in the league.
There is a very real chance I’m overthinking Montreal’s issues and they are as simple as not playing a meaningful game since the leaves changed colour. The switch could flip back on for Montreal at home this weekend but recent history tells me that won’t be the case.
Pick: Argos +2.5, Fajardo UNDER 275.5 pass yards, AND Carey OVER 73.5 rush yards
Saturday, November 9: Saskatchewan Roughriders at Winnipeg Blue Bombers — 6:30 p.m. EST
The Banjo Bowl takes centre stage on Saturday night in the West Final in Winnipeg with the Bombers hosting the Roughriders.
Winnipeg earned this advantage with a last-second win over the Alouettes in the final week of the season. Meanwhile, Saskatchewan is here after a 28-19 win over the Lions last week in Regina. Winnipeg won the season series against their prairie rivals 2-1 but the Green and White ended up with the better point differential between the two thanks to a 10-point win back in Week 7.
The undisputed biggest matchup in this game is Brady Oliveira versus the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ defence.
The Riders’ run defence was the best in the CFL this season and in the West Semi-Final, the Lions went with the “why bother” strategy and only handed it off to William Stanback seven times for 27 yards. Saskatchewan also shut down Oliveira on the ground this year, holding him to under 50 yards rushing in all three games.
But here is the catch — pun VERY much intended. Stanback averaged over 10 yards a reception, going for 53 yards on five catches. The Riders struggled with short passes to the back, which was an issue for them against the Bombers as well. Oliveira had an 80-yard receiving game against the Riders this year, as well as a 60-yard game. If the Bombers can use the short pass game as an extension of the run, life gets very easy for Zach Collaros.
On the flip side, if Corey Mace’s defence can do what they have done to almost everyone else this year and make the Winnipeg offence one-dimensional, then the Green and White could be playing in Vancouver next week.
We know what this Riders defence has done this year in the takeaway department. They forced three more interceptions in the West Semi-final after leading the CFL in turnover ratio in the regular season. And when the calendar flips to November, interceptions tend to pop up in Collaros’ game.
Obviously, this has been a fantastic era of Blue Bombers football and Collaros has been a big part of that but the stat lines haven’t looked that great. The last time the Kelce brothers’ favourite CFL QB had a 250+ yard playoff game was in the 2019 West Final, when he went for 267 yards against Solomon Elimimian and the Saskatchewan Roughriders. In the seven playoff games since then, Collaros has thrown for an average of 199 yards/game with four TDs and eight interceptions.
That is not to delegitimize Collaros’ impact on this grand era of Blue Bombers football. He has done what he has needed to do for them to win a lot of those games, oftentimes with the help of a great run game. But if the Riders can take the run away from Winnipeg, you are setting up a QB prone to throwing interceptions to have to throw more against a defence that is very good at forcing them.
