In the moments following the Hamilton Ticats heartbreaking, gut-wrenching 20-16 Grey Cup loss, Brandon Banks emerged from the team’s locker room, as media members were waiting to head inside to interview, well, him, principally.
But the man they call “Speedy B” was still too upset to talk about having a cup winning touchdown ripped from his grasp, and he zipped through the gauntlet of reporters with just a shake of his head.
No one could blame him.
Inside the Ticat locker room, just what you’d expect; a quiet space filled with athletes who were either angry or despondent, or both.
“I’m at a loss for words, man,” said rookie linebacker Taylor Reed, the man who was flagged for an illegal block, nullifying Banks’ electrifying punt return touchdown run, late in the fourth quarter.
To his credit, Reed was later seen answering questions from a number of reporters, a number of different times as he tried to put his own disappointment into those elusive words.
“Whether it was close or not, whether it should have been called or not, I shouldn’t even have put it in the referee’s hands to make it even close for him to call it,” said Reed, who would not walk away from responsibility for the penalty.
His teammates were having none of that. 
“You can’t blame anybody. Football’s never a one play game,” said linebacker Simoni Lawrence, who was much less than his usual energetic, joking self, as you’d expect.
“It’s hard to deal with,” he said quietly. “Frickin’ losing sucks. Losing like that sucks even more. It’s part of the game, though. You’ve gotta be a pro.
You’ve gotta take it. that’s just how football is.”
Offensive lineman Peter Dyakowski was in the same boat as the others, looking for a way to describe how elation became – so quickly – heartbreak. He couldn’t qualify the feeling, however. What he could do, was offer a clear picture of what that most important moment of the 102nd Grey Cup looked like.
“On the sideline, from where I was, there was a moment where I saw he (Banks) was gonna break it and then I saw the flag in the air,” he said, with a slight shake of his head. “His whole run, I’m just hoping, praying it was something else. But you know what it is.”
“Sometimes there are no words that are adequate,” said the Ticats’ Director of U.S. Scouting, Eric Tillman.
“Hopefully, in time, the greatest emotion will be a sense of pride for the organization,” he added, providing the pivot point for the team going forward.
“It’s tough to look for consolation right now,” said Dyakowski, who made it all the way back into action after nearly a year spent recovering from a knee injury. As he searched for that consolation, he acknowledged the great task ahead in trying to return to the championship game for a third straight year, while expressing a belief that his teammates have the right stuff to do it.
“Top to bottom, there isn’t a guy you wouldn’t want on this team,” Dyakowski insisted, finding at least a little of that hard-to-locate consolation.
The Ticats showed everyone during this past week, just how close a band of brothers they are. If they can keep the core of the group together – not always an easy task in the ever fluid world of modern sport – they will be a formidable force in the East again in 2015.
“We have a terrific organization with a lot of great people,” said Tillman, who graciously put a pause on our interview to shake hands with Calgary defensive coordinator Rich Stubler, offering him congratulations. “From ownership, throughout the organization… people at every level,” he continued.
“Right now this one stings,” Tillman said. “We’ll get to next year in time, but I know this. This team is well built and well coached.”
And but for one flag, late in the game, they’d have been Grey Cup Champions, although as Dyakowski states, there were other opportunities in this game for the Ticats to wrestle control.
“Football really makes you focus on one play and that last play is what everyone’s gonna look at, but we had other chances,” he said.
“We’ve got a long off-season ahead of us,” said Dyakowski, reflecting on the lingering memories of what almost was.
“It takes a lot to get here. We did a lot to get here. And we’ve got to do it all over again,” he said.
