John MacKinnon
Edmonton Journal
EDMONTON – It was a game only defensive technicians could love, but on first blush, this may be the way the Edmonton Eskimos will win this year – not with flash and offence, but with grit and guile and energy on defence.
In a showdown against longtime Eskimo quarterback Ricky Ray and the Toronto Argonauts that was more than six months in the making, Edmonton survived thanks to big, timely plays from its defence.
But they did survive, winning 19-15 in the CFL opener for both clubs. A win, any win, even an ugly one, certainly beat having their long-time quarterback returning to slice and dice them in front of 35,538 at Commonwealth Stadium.
The game wound down in a scenario the Eskimos must have dreaded since they made that controversial Ray trade to Toronto last December. The ball was in Ray’s hands, there were slightly less than two minutes to go and the Argos were driving to score the winning major.
Ray moved the Argos from their own 19-yard line to the Edmonton 37 before the defence stiffened and kiboshed any last-minute heroics from the 32-year-old Ray.
On second-and-eight, Ray completed a pass to running back Cory Boyd, who was shut down all game (10 catches for nine yards and seven carries for 21 yards, not counting the 27-yard ramble at the end of the first half with the Eskimos in prevent defence).
Then Ray put the ball in the hands of his most effective yards-after-catch playmaker, but the shifty Chad Owens was able to gain only four yards as Eskimo linebacker J.C. Sherritt made a sure tackle and that was pretty much that.
“You know, I had just gotten into my zone,” said Sherritt, all of five-foot-nine and 218 pounds. “You kind of feel that flow to the outside (and react).
“But, honestly, that’s T.J.’s (linebacker Hill) play. T.J. got outside leverage and forced that right back into me. He’s done that his whole career, he understands the game so well. Without T.J. forcing that back in, that play doesn’t happen.”
Well, football is the ultimate team game. But Sherritt made 11 defensive tackles in the game, along with two on special teams. This replicated, almost to the tackle, his opening-game performance last year against the Saskatchewan Roughriders in Regina.
Oh, and he also forced an Argo fumble in another exercise in perpetual motion on defence. Sherritt’s motor was running from start to finish, which is his trademark. But that typified the play of Edmonton’s defence.
“I think I’ve always kind of played that way,” Sherritt said. “That’s a big reason I’m playing here.
“If you’re smaller, you’d better have some other attributes. That’s just been the way I’ve played – if you keep running to the ball, good things are going to happen.”
Sure, just ask Eskimo cornerback Rod Williams, who ran to the ball in a stone-cold panic late in the first half to break up an almost certain touchdown pass from Ray to the ubiquitous Owens.
“He had me beat,” Williams said. “I had to use my makeup speed and get to him to try to get up and knock the ball down, and I did.”
It was an impressive performance by the Edmonton defence in many ways, not least was the discipline they demonstrated. The referees meted out just seven penalties totalling 62 yards to the Esks, compared to 18 fouls for 118 yards for the Argos, which made a significant difference in field position.
“I feel we could be a lot better,” Williams said, by way of self-assessment. “We gave up a lot of things, like missed tackles. We need to work on tackling better, but our speed is there. We have a fast defence.”
Not to mention an opportunistic one.
The Eskimos’ deep, talented defensive line harassed Ray much of the game, recording three sacks – two by Almondo Sewell, another by Don Oramasionwu.
The second of Sewell’s sacks came when the Argos were at the Edmonton 14-yard line late in the fourth quarter, poised to score a game-tying major.
The sack pushed the Argos back to the 23 yard-line, and Noel Prefontaine drilled a 30-yard field goal to complete the scoring. The former Eskimo all-purpose kicker had a miserable night, missing two of four field goals, including a 24-yard attempt that hit the uprights early in the final quarter.
“That’s what this team is made up of – young men that no one knows the names of,” Reed said of his proficient, if not high-profile, defence. “They fly under the radar, but they pick up their lunch pail and they go to work every day.”
They sure went to work on Saturday, and they had to to secure the team’s season-opening victory on a night when the offence reinforced pre-season fears and sputtered under the guidance of quarterback Steven Jyles.
Edmonton’s offence was, in effect, a cluster of big-time playmakers in search of a consistent quarterback, just as so many people diagnosed all off-season. Of course, it was also the first full game Jyles played with this offence. Things take time.
But that, as they say, is another story. And it was, after all, a victory, one the Eskimos gladly will take and not look back.
They have no choice. They play the Roughriders in Saskatchewan next Sunday.
