As the Ottawa REDBLACKS kick off their quest to capture the 104th Grey Cup Saturday night in Edmonton, they’ll do so against the same team that stopped them just short of the ultimate goal last season.
Just over six months since the Edmonton Eskimos downed the REDBLACKS 26-20 in last year’s championship game, the two square off again at Commonwealth Stadium this weekend. But while the Grey Cup re-match may be an easy storyline to grab onto, Ottawa’s players and coaches aren’t getting caught up in the talk.
To them, Saturday’s game is the first of 18 big games in a long season. Most importantly, after a two-game pre-season, it means real competition has arrived.
“Training camp is training camp,” said quarterback Henry Burris, last year’s CFL Most Outstanding Player. “You enjoy the process of coming out here and practising and getting ready for the season but you get to a point where it’s like, man, enough of this, let’s get to the real stuff.”
Burris: “Enough of this, let’s get to the real stuff.”
Many of the REDBLACKS players and coaches involved in Saturday’s game were also on the field last year for the final game, from head coach Rick Campbell to Burris to East Division final hero, receiver Greg Ellingson. Fellow receiver Brad Sinopoli, one of four receivers who recorded at least 1,000 yards last year, is also back but said that, while losing in the Grey Cup game stung, his team has plenty of motivation aside from that.
“It’s hard to forget the loss but at the same time it’s two different teams and a new season, it’s a totally different situation,” Sinopoli said. “We’re not talking about last year, we’re just going in trying to get our first victory.”
If the Grey Cup loss had one major result, it was that the returning group is tighter coming into 2016.
“You never want to lose a championship but we did and it made us better and stronger as a team and as a family,” said REDBLACKS linebacker Damaso Munoz.
“We’ve got a hungry group coming to Edmonton and it’s going to be a great show.”
The REDBLACKS play their first two games of the 2016 season on the road – the game Saturday in Edmonton is followed by a date with the Alouettes in Montreal next Thursday – before Ottawa returns to TD Place for their Home Opener against the Calgary Stampeders on July 8.
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