Welcome to Canadian football.
It was the first game of a freshly signed, ground-breaking deal to televise 14 CFL games this season on the NFL Network. And, ooooh la golly lolly, what a game they got for the first one.
On Canada Day it was a game to celebrate.
It was a frantic, frenzied, furious, fabulous 54-51 come-from-21-points-behind, double-overtime ring-a-ling-a-ding-dong-dandy complete with two point converts in OT and one of the most amazing back-of-the-endzone diving catches imaginable.
It was the rematch of last year’s Montreal Alouettes’ Grey Cup win made memorable when the Saskatchewan Roughriders gave the game away when they had it won as a result of a special teams too-many-men-on-the-field penalty which, beyond belief, their defence reenacted in the last minute of this one.
Trailing 33-12 in the second half, the Roughriders came back to tie it 40-40 in regulation of a game which featured 1,116 total yards, 1,058 yards of net offence, 846 passingyards, a 125-yard missed field goal return for a touchdown, 13 touchdowns in all, 10 plays of 30-plus yards, a blocked punt and a partridge in a pear tree.
It’s amazing the NFL didn’t cancel the series the next morning. They don’t play football games that look like that in the NFL. Only in Canada. This is why the “It’s Our Game” slogan has hit such a cord in the country where Grey Cup games, far more frequently than Super Bowls, are compelling, captivating, exceptionally entertaining events.
“Obviously that was an exceptionally exciting game to start. There were so many unbelievable plays,” said NFL Network spokesman Dennis Johnson. “If they are all like that it’s going to be a tremendous season of games.”
And don’t underestimate the significance of what that game meant as an introduction to Canadian football, and advertisement for the great northern version of the game.
“Huge,” said Edmonton Eskimos’ GM Danny Maciocia at practice Friday.
“Huge! Huge! Huge!
“The NFL Network reaches 60 million homes. It gives this league an opportunity to illustrate how professional it is and at the same time how much fun our game can be to watch. It’s going to be huge when it comes to recruiting.”
There was no word on the viewing audience in the U.S. due to the July 4 holiday weekend but the lid-lifter became the most watched CFL opening game ever on TSN at 1.06 million.
If you want to judge reaction from an American who had never seen a live Canadian football league game before watching that one, you didn’t have to go south. There were two imports on the property who made the Eskimos on the defensive line this year, Ken Pettway and Andre Coleman, who were still trying to pop their eyes back in at practice yesterday.
“I really expected to see guys fly around. But 54-51? You don’t expect to see that. That really showed what this league is all about,” said Coleman.
“Man, that was a thrilling game,” said Pettway.
“What a crazy catch in the end zone! And that too-many-men penalty! It was so much fun to watch.
“And fast! I thought I had an idea of what to expect from the pre-season but I never expected to see something like that. You watch it and wonder if you’re going to play in games like that.”
Ricky Ray has, of course. Lots. There are wild and crazy games scattered throughout every CFL season.
And then there are Grey Cups like Edmonton’s double overtime 38-35 win over Montreal with a multitude of lead changes in which Ray went 35 for 45 to win MVP honours in 2005.
“It seemed like one team would go down and score and then the other team would march right back and do the same thing. It was a wild game,” he remembered.
There’s a pride import CFL stars take in the Canadian game and those players were thankful of the dazzling display produced by the Riders and Als.
“It was awesome for it to be the game to be the one to debut on the NFL Network. It shows that we have an exciting game in which you can never count a team out and there is so much opportunity to come back,” said the Eskimos quarterback.
“I’m proud of this league. It’s a great league.”
terry.jones@sunmedia.ca
