Not all wins are picturesque \u2014 and that\u2019s just fine for B.C. Lions quarterback Nathan Rourke.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A victory is a victory, after all.<\/p>\n
Rourke and the Lions extended their season with a narrow 33-30 win over the visiting\u00a0Calgary\u00a0Stampeders in the West Division semifinal on Saturday.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think good teams find ways to win ugly games. And this was an ugly game offensively for us,\u201d said the Canadian quarterback. \u201cAnd it\u2019s the greatest team game in the world for a reason.\u201d<\/p>\n
B.C. held a 13-point lead midway through the third quarter Saturday, but\u00a0Calgary\u00a0rallied to tie the game with 33 seconds left in the fourth.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Veteran Lions kicker Sean Whyte booted a 43-yard field goal as time expired to seal the win.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe lost,\u201d Stampeders head coach Dave Dickenson said of the result. \u201cSome are tougher than others. It was a tough one. I think we deserved a better fate, but you know what? We still lost.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThey made the extra plays. I thought we were the better team in the fourth quarter, had our chances, didn\u2019t get the job done, and they did.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Lions will now face the Saskatchewan Roughriders in the West Division final in Regina on Nov. 8.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s victory extended B.C.\u2019s win streak to seven straight games, and head coach Buck Pierce said he hopes the experience will help his group moving forward.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re all tough. Winning at this level is hard. They\u2019re all tough,\u201d he said. \u201cHopefully, out of each game, you take a little bit of something, and we\u2019re a couple plays smarter next week.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Stampeders and Lions came into Saturday\u2019s tilt with identical 11-7 records in regular-season play, but B.C. got home-field advantage because the Lions took the head-to-head matchup with a pair of wins over\u00a0Calgary.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rourke threw for 223 yards, connecting on 16 of his 23 attempts, and contributed a rushing touchdown in the victory.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jeremiah Masoli added a one-yard major for B.C., Robert Carter Jr. sprinted 95 yards up the field for a touchdown off a kickoff return, and Whyte made four field goals for the Lions, including the winner.<\/p>\n
Calgary\u00a0quarterback Vernon Adams Jr. amassed 334 passing yards against his former team, making good on 23 of 33 attempts.<\/p>\n
He completed TD passes to Clark Barnes and Jalen Philpott, and Quincy Vaughn added a rushing major. Rene Paredes kicked three field goals for the Stamps, including one for 50 yards.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt hurts. It sucks,\u201d Adams said. \u201cSomeone had to lose. Someone had to win. It\u2019s a good team over there. We fought our butts off.\u201d<\/p>\n
The fourth quarter provided a show for the announced crowd of 26,383 fans at B.C. Place, with\u00a0Calgary\u00a0rallying from a six-point deficit to twice tie the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Midway through the frame, Adams sailed a 40-yard pass to Barnes, setting the Stampeders up with a first down at B.C.\u2019s 12-yard line. Vaughn capped the drive with a one-yard touchdown, but Paredes missed the convert, leaving the score at 27-27 with 7:46 left on the game clock.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Lions got a crucial turnover with less than two minutes to go in the fourth when Calgary\u2019s Erik Brooks fumbled a punt return and Kieran Poissant got to the ball inside Stampeders\u2019 territory.\u00a0<\/p>\n
B.C. struggled to make use of the possession and relied on a 39-yard field goal from Whyte to take a 30-27 lead with 67 seconds left.<\/p>\n
The motivated Stampeders got to work, with Adams throwing a 42-yard pass to Philpott that put\u00a0Calgary\u00a0within striking distance. The quarterback\u2019s next two attempts fell incomplete, and Paredes once again evened the score at 30-30 with a 38-yard field goal.<\/p>\n
A 28-yard pass from Rourke to Canadian receiver Justin McInnis got the Lions into field goal territory and Whyte went back to work, putting a 43-yard kick through the uprights as time expired.<\/p>\n
Asked what he was feeling as his kicker lined up for the play, Pierce smiled.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cUtter confidence,\u201d the coach said. \u201cI see how they work, I see how they operate. Just confidence.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Seeing the defence and special teams step up when the offence wasn\u2019t posting its usual gaudy numbers showed what makes the Lions special, Rourke said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI think maybe we\u2019re more well rounded than even we thought,\u201d the quarterback said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it just speaks to the depth of our team, the belief of our team to be able to rely and trust each other \u2026 just being able to trust that the other person is going to do that job. And we talked a lot about that this week, and I think it showed on the field.\u201d<\/p>\n
Earlier Saturday, the Montreal Alouettes outlasted the Winnipeg Blue Bombers for a 42-33 victory in the East Division semifinal to secure a spot in the East final against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, also on Nov. 8.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The winners of the two division finals will battle at the Grey Cup in Winnipeg on Nov. 16.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Not all wins are picturesque \u2014 and that\u2019s just fine for B.C. Lions quarterback Nathan Rourke.\u00a0 A victory…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":258512,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-258511","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\/258511","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=258511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258511\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}