All-star linebacker Adam Bighill makes his\u00a0Calgary\u00a0Stampeders debut one year after a serious knee injury that ultimately landed him with a new CFL club.<\/p>\n
The 36-year-old, who has won the league\u2019s Most Outstanding Defensive Player award three times in his career, was signed to Calgary\u2019s practice roster in June after six years with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.<\/p>\n
Bighill was activated for Monday\u2019s Labour Day game in\u00a0Calgary\u00a0against the Edmonton Elks.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been a long road to get back to this point,\u201d he said Sunday at McMahon Stadium.<\/p>\n
Bighill was a key cog in helping the Blue Bombers end a 28-year Grey Cup drought in 2019 and in winning another in 2021.<\/p>\n
The middle linebacker underwent season-ending knee surgery after injuring his anterior cruciate ligament in Winnipeg\u2019s Labour Day weekend game against the Saskatchewan Roughriders last year. Winnipeg released him in the off-season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve always had an underdog story, so this is just another challenge that I rise up against,\u201d said Bighill.<\/p>\n
Calgary\u00a0(7-3-0) wants to stretch its unbeaten streak against West Division opponents to 6-0 on Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you can beat those teams in the West, that\u2019s how you end up winning your conference and that\u2019s what we want, a first-round bye,\u201d Stampeders general manger and head coach Dave Dickenson said.<\/p>\n
Edmonton (4-6-0) started the season 1-6, but rides a three-game win streak into\u00a0Calgary.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In four starts since taking over for Tre Ford, quarterback Cody Fajardo has completed 77 per cent of pass attempts for an average of 272 passing yards per game and a total of four touchdowns.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Fajardo has also rushed for 100 yards and a touchdown over those four games.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe has lifted the room,\u201d said Elks head coach Mark Kilam. \u201cWe look different with him at the controls, but he has this veteran presence that elevates his teammates, and I think you see that in our offence.\u201d<\/p>\n
The game will also be the first of the regular season at McMahon for Kilam after almost two decades on Calgary\u2019s coaching staff, including the last 14 seasons of his tenure as special teams co-ordinator. The Stampeders hosted the Elks in a pre-season game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe got all the feels out in the pre-season,\u201d Kilam said. \u201cWe\u2019re just focused on what\u2019s in front and that\u2019s just a big game versus a really good football team.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a dozen seasons with both the B.C. Lions and Winnipeg, Bighill ranks sixth all-time in defensive tackles (891) in the CFL. He\u2019s a six-time CFL all-star who also won a Grey Cup with the Lions in 2011.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s kind of seen and done it and a lot of the guys, because we\u2019re so new and fresh and he hasn\u2019t been here, it\u2019s not like they know a lot about his career,\u201d Dickenson said. \u201cIn my opinion, he\u2019s certainly a Hall of Famer if not up there in first-ballot territory.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bighill didn\u2019t suit up against his former club in Calgary\u2019s three regular-season wins over Winnipeg, although a playoff meeting is a possibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe energy on Labour Day always is awesome,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve been in part of the one out in Winnipeg and Sask, it\u2019s amazing. From what I\u2019ve seen and heard, it is the same here.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe speed picks up, the excitement picks up, and this is really a mark of the back third of the season, where every team needs to be scratching and clawing to be better every week and points really matter from here on out. So it\u2019s go time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Calgary\u2019s defence has allowed a league-low 15 offensive touchdowns while sacking quarterbacks 17 times in the last six games.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir front four is doing a great job of getting pressure and that allows eight guys to drop back into coverage, which makes the windows really tight for quarterbacks,\u201d Fajardo said. \u201cTheir front four has been a menace this year in creating pressure.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir defensive backs and their linebackers have caught the ball and have made game-changing plays when the ball\u2019s gone their way, so I\u2019ve got to do a tremendous job of protecting the ball tomorrow. That will give us the best chance to win if I can protect the ball and not give them extra possessions or short fields.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fajardo\u2019s record on Labour Day weekend is 1-2 from his days as a Saskatchewan Roughrider, while his\u00a0Calgary\u00a0counterpart Vernon Adams Jr., who was acquired from the Lions last year, gets his first start in a game on the September holiday weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cExcited to feel that adrenalin when the jets fly by,\u201d Adams stated. \u201cWe know this is when the season really starts, this Labour Day weekend. I\u2019m telling the guys, \u2018hey, let\u2019s think playoff mentality. Let\u2019s think win or go home, even though we\u2019re not there yet, but we want to prepare like that.’\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"All-star linebacker Adam Bighill makes his\u00a0Calgary\u00a0Stampeders debut one year after a serious knee injury that ultimately landed him…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-112121","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cfl","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-canadian-football-league","11":"tag-canadianfootballleague","12":"tag-cfl","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}