The Eskimos simply smothered Ottawa's league-leading passing attack to death. After the Redblacks scored two quick touchdowns against primarily man coverage, the Eskimos played a lot more zone, taking away deep and intermediate routes and forcing Burris to check down to running back William Powell, who led all Ottawa receivers with 7 catches for 57 yards. None of the Redblacks' quartet of 1,000-yard receivers was able to stretch the secondary. Powell's 24-yard catch and run in the second quarter was the longest of the day for the Redblacks. Burris threw for 150 yards in the first half but just 70 in the second half, mostly checkdowns to Powell on second and long.
Don Landry of cfl.ca has a good analysis of how the he Eskimos did it.
The Eskimos, according to CFL.ca Grey Cup Insider Rob Bagg, played a heavy dose of man-to man coverage on those first two Ottawa touches and then went primarily with zone schemes after that. "They played a lot of zone, dropping nine," agreed receiver Chris Williams, who was held to two catches and 35 yards, but might have had more, including a touchdown, had Burris not under thrown him in the first quarter, gifting Watkins with an easy pick.
A switch from man coverage to more complicated zone schemes, however, was one of the keys to the Eskimos' Grey Cup triumph, and a reason why the Ottawa offence went from gusher to trickle.
Early adjustment helped Esks shut down REDBLACKS
The TSN panel discussed how Chris Jones' defence has evolved over the years. In the early hears, he was a strict adherent to press man coverage, blitzing heavily and living and dying with the cover skills of dominant DBs such as Brandon Browner in Calgary. Now he plays much more zone, often rushing just 3 or 4 players and dropping 8 or 9 into coverage, lining them up at the first-down marker. A lot of teams play the same way. The Eskimos just do it better than most.