{"id":160655,"date":"2025-09-22T04:14:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T04:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/160655\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T04:14:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T04:14:09","slug":"upon-further-review-wpg-26-ott-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/160655\/","title":{"rendered":"Upon Further Review | Wpg 26 Ott 18"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two schools of thought are circulating in Bomberland right now in the aftermath of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers unique win over the Ottawa Redblacks on Saturday.<\/p>\n

The first: A win is a win is a win no matter how it looks. There are no points for artistic merit in football, after all, and the victory was critical for a Blue Bombers squad missing its starting quarterback and trying to stay in the playoff discussion both through the West Division and a possible crossover spot through the East.<\/p>\n

Further to that, the special teams and defence stepped up when it mattered and the offence cranked out 172 yards along the ground. So, take the road \u2018W\u2019 and get back to work for the next one.<\/p>\n

And the second: agreed on all of the above. But\u2026 what the hell with the passing attack?<\/p>\n

Eight passing attempts and three completions for 54 yards in a full Canadian Football League game? And it\u2019s a \u2018W\u2019?<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a good win that finishes off a good week of preparation. It\u2019s all about getting that \u2018W\u2019 and going 1-0. Simple as that,\u201d said veteran defensive end Willie Jefferson in the locker room Saturday night. \u201cNow we\u2019re coming home to our fans, and we\u2019ve got to to it again. We\u2019ve got to stack these together.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a complete defensive team game, and we got some big plays from special teams. This was one of those games I was telling you about \u2014 the offence was having a hard time putting the ball in the end zone, so the other two phases have to find a way to compliment that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Asked what a result like that might teach some of the younger faces on the roster \u2014 and there are more than some might think \u2014 Jefferson added:<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we can stick to our process and know it\u2019s not going to be easy, know it\u2019s not going to be handed to us\u2026 if we can get that into our minds, then we know we\u2019re going to have to fight these last couple of games for some wins.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be ugly, it\u2019s going to be tough, it\u2019s going to be grimy. If you\u2019re ready to play football, this is the best time to play football.\u201d<\/p>\n

There was a whole lot of ugly in the win, sprinkled with some toughness and coated with grime. But when Chris Streveler puts just eight passes in the air, one of which was intercepted, and completes just three of them for 54 yards\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cYou tell me those numbers, I\u2019m not paying attention to them,\u201d said head coach Mike O\u2019Shea after the win. \u201cI mean, we\u2019re grinding. It was going to be one of those games.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe won. That\u2019s it,\u201d he added when asked to assess the offence. \u201cThat\u2019s what the film is for, that\u2019s what the day after is for. We\u2019ll clean some things up and move forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m proud of the whole team. It\u2019s hard to win in professional sports and we got it done. Period,\u201d added defensive back Deatrick Nichols. \u201cThat\u2019s football. Every win is going to look different; every loss is going to look different. You just try to add them all up and then when the playoffs come, you\u2019re ready for any situation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWins like that, the funny wins where you at the stats and go, \u2018Wow, we pulled something off\u2019 are a plus when you get to the end of the year.\u201d<\/p>\n

ICYMI, here is our Game Recap from Saturday afternoon:<\/p>\n

Game Recap | Wpg 26 Ott 18<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

And what follows is the rest of this week\u2019s Upon Further Review\u2026<\/p>\n

IT\u2019S THE TIME OF THE YEAR WHERE THE STANDINGS\/SCHEDULE WATCH\u2026 is massive, and Saturday\u2019s victory, as much as it was rough around the edges, very much keeps the Blue Bombers in a solid spot with everything happening around them.<\/p>\n

Winnipeg, remember, has won the season series with the B.C. Lions and lost the same to the Calgary Stampeders, but still has a couple of paths open to the playoffs.<\/p>\n

To that point, here are the remaining games the Blue Bombers are in full chase mode with:<\/p>\n

Stampeders (8-5)
Road (4): Montreal, Sept. 26th; B.C., Oct. 4th; Hamilton, Oct. 11th; Edmonton, Oct. 24th
Home (1): Toronto, Oct. 18th<\/p>\n

Blue Bombers (7-7)
Road (1): Edmonton, Oct. 11th
Home (3): Hamilton, Sept. 27th; Saskatchewan, Oct. 17th; Montreal, Oct. 25th<\/p>\n

Lions (7-7)
Road (1):\u00a0Saskatchewan, Oct. 25th
Home (3): Toronto, Sept. 26th; Calgary, Oct. 4th; Edmonton, Oct. 17th<\/p>\n

Elks (5-9)
Road (1): B.C., Oct. 17th
Home (3): Saskatchewan, Sept. 27th; Winnipeg, Oct. 11th; Calgary, Oct. 24th<\/p>\n

Argos (5-9)
Road (3): B.C., Sept. 26th; Saskatchewan, Oct. 10th; Calgary, Oct. 18th
Home (1): Hamilton, Oct. 4th<\/p>\n

THREE NUMBERS WHICH STOOD OUT\u2026 after a second glance at the stats package, which can be found\u00a0here<\/a>:<\/p>\n

1\u00a0No number stands out more from the stats package than the passing totals for Winnipeg in the win. To that end \u2014 and merci beaucoup to Steve Daniel from the CFL for the numbers \u2014 consider this:<\/p>\n

-That was the lowest passing yards total for the Blue Bombers since the club had just 39 in a 15-1 loss to the B.C. Lions on September 9, 1975. Worth noting: less than a year before that the club had just 15 yards passing in a 19-12 win at Hamilton.<\/p>\n

And as we pointed out in our game recap, the Blue Bombers did win a game played in a rainstorm in 1960 with zero completions and zero passing yards.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Further to the above: the 54 yards passing was the lowest by any team in the CFL since Edmonton had 49 in a game in 2015.<\/p>\n

And one more: in the last 49 years only one team had three completions or less in a game. The Shreveport Pirates had one completion in 20 attempts in a 1994 game.<\/p>\n

2\u00a0One of the sidebar stories that came out of the result on Saturday was the end of Nic Demski\u2019s consecutive game streak with at least one catch, which now stops at 84.<\/p>\n

Demski drew an offside penalty on one target attempted to him in the first quarter and was the intended target on the interception thrown by Streveler. He also caught an 11-yard pass early in the fourth quarter, but the reception was wiped out by a holding penalty.<\/p>\n

Still, for the team\u2019s leading receiver to be held off the stat sheet is telling \u2014 especially with his ability to do so much damage on the shovel passes and receiver sweeps he has made a living at for eons.<\/p>\n

3 One of the cooler stats to come out of Saturday\u2019s win was the 128-yard missed field goal return for a TD by Trey Vaval \u2014 a Blue Bombers record and the fourth longest in CFL history. (FYI, it was initially called a 129-yard return by the stats crew and then adjusted).<\/p>\n

The CFL record for a missed field goal return is 131 yards, which prompted a smart question from a reader about how a return can cover that distance given the 20-yard end zones. The record was set in 1958, back when end zones were 25 yards deep.<\/p>\n

After the game we asked Vaval if he had any gas left in the tank after his first return (he added a 71-yarder later).<\/p>\n

\u201cNo,\u201d he said with a grin. \u201cI got down there and then to the sidelines and my legs kinda died. But the trainers gave me some electrolytes, and I felt better after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

And when we asked how close he was to busting the second one?<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d he said with a shrug. \u201cLike I said before, I kind of black out when I return the ball. I just catch the ball, trust my blockers and try to hit it. I saw the kicker coming and with the angle he had and someone behind me, I couldn\u2019t really cut back. I just wanted to get as much yardage as I could for my team.\u201d<\/p>\n

AND FINALLY\u2026 thanks for reading this far and for those who have made it to the bottom and want to see the video evidence of the win in Ottawa, we have it here with the condensed game:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two schools of thought are circulating in Bomberland right now in the aftermath of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":160656,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-160655","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\/160655","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=160655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160655\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160656"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}