Justin Dunk
Ticats.ca
On a night when many were wearing pink in support of women’s cancer, Travis Lulay saw a lot of black and gold.
Hamilton snapped B.C.’s eight-game winning streak on the strength of their defence, who had arguably their best effort of the season in holding the league’s number two scoring offence to just 10 points. Lulay was under intense heat for most of the evening and was knocked out of the game midway through the fourth quarter with an ankle injury.
“Our defence was really physical and our secondary made Lulay hold the ball and gave time to our guys up front to get there,” head coach Marcel Bellefeuille said.
After giving up a 25-yard first quarter touchdown pass to Geroy Simon the defence only allowed three points the rest of the way in a dominant performance by all three levels on the defensive unit.
“That’s where we need to get to, to be the defence we want to be,” Bellefeuille said.
In the secondary, rookie Woodny Turenne, making just his second career start at field corner, was excellent in coverage, making a number of plays on the football.
“Coach Chamblin has been preaching that it was time for us to take that next step, we just listened to our coach and took that next step,” starting safety Carlos Thomas said. “Communication and effort, it all started from practice this week, we communicated well all week and it carried over into the game.”
Linebacker Ray Mariuz, a nine-year veteran, had an interception touchdown, the first major score of his career, in the fourth quarter.
“We were in safe punt because we were expecting a fake,” Mariuz said. “The defensive line did a good job of rushing McCallum and he threw it up – when it was in the air I thought wow this is a gift – then I caught it and told myself don’t get tackled by the kicker and the guys did a good job of blocking up front, so it was a pretty easy score.”
Renauld Williams, who led the defence with six tackles and a sack, was active all night long.
However, it was number 42 for the Ticats that had a sneaky good performance. Brandon Denson was brought in a number of times on second down pass rush situations and forced Lulay out of the pocket or let the ball fly before route combinations were fully developed.
The point scoring charge for the Tiger-Cats was led by kicker Justin Medlock, who made all seven field goals he attempted on the evening with a long of 48 yards.
Kevin Glenn played the first half at quarterback before giving way to Quinton Porter in the second. Glenn was 9 of 18 passing for 116 yards and Porter was 8 of 10 for 116 yards, one touchdown through the air and one on the ground.
The turning point for Hamilton came just before the end of the first half. Carlos Thomas laid a whack on Lions receiver Geroy Simon who was coming across the middle, the hit knocked the ball out of Simon’s hands and forced the Lions to punt.
“I pretty much had a good bead on Lulay for the whole night. He eyed him down and he set him up [for the hit],” starting safety Carlos Thomas said.
Marc Beswick would come free the next play and blocked Paul McCallum’s punt, which was recovered by Daryl Stephenson and set the Cats up deep in Lions territory. After Aaron Kelly drew a pass interference call, Quinton Porter snuck into the end zone from one-yard out to give Hamilton a 16-10 lead heading to recess – an advantage they would not relinquish, pummeling the Lions 42-10. Mariuz summed up the win well.
“It was a good day all around.”
