Why We Lost The Western Final!!!

[Blitz]

We just lost the Western Final for the second time at home in the past three seasons. What is really heartbreaking is that we've had the best team in the league in 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007 but only have one Grey Cup to show for a team that had every opportunity to have been a dynasty and perhaps one of the greatest teams every to play the game, along with the Eskimos who won five straight.

Everyone has to take their share of the blame for this loss. Certainly the three turnovers in the first half put us in a bit of a hole and they will be blamed for the loss. However, we had crawled back from those turnovers…tying the game 10-10 and ww were down by just a field goal going into the second half. We only turned the football over once in the second half and it cost us a field goal.

We were down by a touchdown in the third quarter in hostile territory in Regina, the last time we played the Roughriders, for first place in the league. We pulled it out with two great fourth quarter drives, including the last one, when Jarious hit Geroy Simon in the end zone to win the game. We still had every opportunity to win this game, even with the early turnovers. We didn't!!

These are my thoughts:

JARIOUS JACKSON

We should have stayed with Jarious. He was 8-1 as a starter going into this game. We should have stayed with the guy who brought us to the dance. We were behind in a number of big games this year with Jarious and he pulled them out with great second half performances. He’s had awful stats in the first half of a number of his games this season, including this one. Still he has overcome and he was our best chance to do that again today.

Jarious moved our offence enough to put 10 points on the board without the benefit of any turnovers, big special team plays, or good field position. He was pulled too early, especially considering the amount of playing time that Dickenson had this season. Jarious had proved his big play ability in the second half of games this season, including crunch time. We should have stayed with him longer.

DAVE DICKENSON

Dave Dickenson put up good passing stats today, as he always does, but I commented before this game, at the very most, he should not pay more than a quarter and a half. I also commented that I hoped that Jarious was not on too short of a rope. He was!!! Dickenson was quoted, during this two week layoff, that the starter should be on a shorter rope in the playoffs. Dickenson wanted this opportunity and he got it.

However, I don’t blame Dickenson for this loss. He didn’t lose the game for us. He just didn’t give us the best chance to win and that’s not his fault. Last season, when he had played a lot of games, going into the playoffs, Dickenson played very well, as I expected. However, in 2004, when he was rusty, in 2005, when he had missed the last 6 games of the season, and today, when he had also played very little this season, Wally still went to him. Wally said he made a mistake by 'listening to his heart in 2004, he listened to his fortunte teller in 2005, and this time I don't know whether he listened to his heart, his head, or his gut, but he once again went to something that has been proven to him before that it does not work.

Of course Dickenson is going to want to play. He’s competitive and believes in himself. He has fans who believe he can pull off miracles. He came into his first game, late this season, following his recovery from his concussion, and on his first play and made a great throw to Clermont. Suddenly his fans were commenting he was SuperDave’ and he was going to take us to the Promised Land again. He couldn’t and he shouldn’t have been expected to.

He played as well today as you could expect for a quarterback who only played three weeks early this season and about three quarters in the last two games of the season. It was obvious today that Dickenson was not going to be able to nickel and dime the Riders defense and put points on the board easily. It's very hard to do that in the CFL anymore. You may be able to move the football a little but it's hard to score points that way anymore. Ask Ricky Ray!!

It was obvious in the fourth quarter Dickenson was not going to bring us back. His lack of mobility showed up. We lost the league lead, in terms of lowest sacks given up last game, when Dickenson gave up five sacks. He gave up five sacks again today. We led the league in giving up the most sacks the last two season. Dickenson can overcome those high sacks totals when he is at the top of his game. He couldn’t be expected to be at the top of his game today and he wasn’t! Wally gave Dickenson the situation that Dickenson wanted.

However Wally should have played the odds better and waited much longer to bring Dickenson in, if he brought him in at all. Wally has gone conservative in the playoffs with his quarterback situation and it's been costly. You're much better off going with the quarterback who has played regularly and well before the playoffs. That was Dickenson last year but it wasn't this season.

OUR GAME PLAN-A RETURN TO 'CHAP BALL'

It was wonderful this season to watch a balanced, diversified offensive attack. It was a treat to see the two back set at times, using Smith at fullback and Ian Smart at tailback on the counter toss and quick pitch. It was great to see Lyle Green line up at fullback and Smith at tailback to run counters and off-tackle plays. It was exciting to see a passing attack that challenged defenses vertically. It was thrilling to see us bootleg Jarious Jackson and move him around to put pressure on a defense.

I have no idea what happened in the last couple of games of the season and especially today except that I do know that we returned to the Chap Ball version of our offense. We started to go almost exclusively to the single back set with rare exception. We started to throw those crossing patterns way too often again. Think back to the last couple of games and the number of times that Clermont has been almost killed running crossing patterns against underneath zone defenses. We started to over focus on the underneath crossing pattern game again. We had been a dynamic running team that used play action to set up the vertical passing game. Suddenly they were thrown out the window.

We decreased our run variety towards the end of the season, stopped running the football as much, and stopped using play action and bootlegs. It was like the Chap, fired in Edmonton, was secretly running our offence again.

Suddenly the quarterback sacks were back in the last game, we were throwing every pass out of the pocket, and we had become bland and predictable after not being that way all season. The Riders were all over our crossing patterns today and our receivers were tightly covered all game. Down by 3 points at the half we completely moved away from our running game and went to a nickel and dime passing offence that isn’t going to get it done, in terms of scoring, in today’s CFL!!

OUR OFFENSIVE LINE

Our offensive line will take a lot of crap after this game but there are reasons why they didn't play well. Our offensive line flourished when we had a diversified running game, used play action, and had a quarterback who set up deep in the pocket, bootlegged at times, and was mobile. The run, play action, and pass gave us a balanced offence that kept oppostion defenses off-balance. Suddenly we became a one back set team that only ran the inside zone run and the stretch play occasionally.

Play action became non-existent. Add in the constant criticism of our offensive line playing dirty... and they became much more passive and hesitant. They stopped playing with the kind of aggressiveness that made them so good. Yes, we lost Sherko and Valli in this game and Plante had to come in... but we were being beaten out there before that happened. Our offence changed and being under the microscope also hurt our offensive line play. The injury at right guard just added more fuel to the problem.

The Story of Our Defense

Our defense finished fifth against the pass this season. Some may find this a surprising statistic when you see how many of our defensive backs made the West all-star team.

Our defense, under Ritchie, has mostly been a complex defense that constantly changed it’s pass rush and it’s coverages. We forced early passes with pressure and caused turnovers with an aggressive style. We started to get away from playing that way as the seasson progressed,, going with the four or three man rush and blitzing not very often. We tried that strategy again today, in the first quarter and it was a dismal failure.

However, I give Ritchie credit for changing up and going back to a more aggressive style from that point on. Our defense did a great job on Joseph in the second quarter. We put a lot of pressure on Joseph after that first quarter. However, our defensive backs struggled at times with coverage. One reason is they started to play much less disciplined and much more individual back there. Miles missed coverages as did Mark Washington. Secondly, uncharateristically there was confusion when Rider backs and receivers swung out of the backfield, in terms of coverage. Thirdly the Riders ran two receivers almost side by side or in tandem, before breaking into their cuts, and wes struggled with it.

We also missed the three linebacker set that we used so often last season, especially on first downs, with excellent success. With Carl Kidd gone this season, Floyd and Glatt hurt at various times, and Jamal Johnson hurt and missing as well, we went with a two linebacker set way too often this season. It really showed up today in the Western Final. We missed the aggressiveness of that third linebacker, who we often used to blitz in the past. When quarterbacks got time this season, they were able to get receivers very open, something that we were not used to seeing from our defense over the past two seasons.

Defense On the Field Too Long/Too Many Short Fields

Our defense was on the field too long today and had way too many short fields to defend. The Riders started their offence in our end of the field six times in today's Western Final. Add in four turnovers and it was a recipe for a very tough game for our defense. Throw in the fact that our offence has not been rushing the football as well or scoring as often recently, as we moved more to a Chap Ball offence and our defense started to be on the field more often.

They came up with big plays at crucial times but the trend was not our friend and we couldn't come up with those huge turnovers on defense today. Cameron Wake continued to be a force to be reckoned with, Hunt and Williams played very solid in the middle but Brent Johnson’s disappearing act in the second half of the season continued in this Western Final. Without linebackers to blitz the quarterback they began to roll away from Cameron Wake, as Joseph did today at times, and found time to throw. Even Wake’s five record sacks in today’s playoff game weren’t enough nor was the fact that the Riders had a running back in Wes Cates who was so injured he could hardly cut out there.

ITS SO MUCH HARDER TO REPEAT

We were dominated by the Riders defense today. We were outcoached and outplayed. It’s hard to create the same kind of hunger to repeat that it is to win the first time. We lost because of strategy and lost because we lost too many individual battles. The Riders just plain wanted it more and it showed!

Wrap

There will be fans who will say that the four turnovers we lost today cost us the game. They really hurt. However, three of those turnovers happened in the first half and we were only a field goal down to start the third quarter. We’ve overcome a lot tougher situations this season but today we couldn’t!!

Our offence was completely bogged down, outside of the one short touchdown pass after the Smart kickoff return to the 11 yard line. In the end it was too little offence and a defense that was on the field much too long and very often in poor field position. We lost to a team that had a better game plan and played a much tougher game, mentally and physically, even though they were hurting and we were healthy.

Good luck is when preparation meets opportunity! That’s why the Riders had luck on their side today!!

[wildthing]

good analysis Blitz, I think the major turning point for the Lions was in the second half when instead of conceding a safety, Wally chose to have McCallum punt from the goal line area. Riders the took that possession in for a TD (from around the BC 50), then after the kickoff DD was sacked and fumbled basically a 8 point gain for the riders where a safety would have been 2 points and major field position change.

[Luke]

I'd agree Wildthing. I think that was it as well. I assume you're referring to the first Lion drive of the second half that started at about their seven yd line? When they went two and out, and punted, which set up the Rider TD to go up 20-10?

[Soundy]

Innumerable penalties didn't help, either... offside after offside, especially by our offense.

[Rammer]

good analysis Blitz, I think the major turning point for the Lions was in the second half when instead of conceding a safety, Wally chose to have McCallum punt from the goal line area. Riders the took that possession in for a TD (from around the BC 50), then after the kickoff DD was sacked and fumbled basically a 8 point gain for the riders where a safety would have been 2 points and major field position change.

Lions have battled their way out of that situation all season. If there was a time to take advantage it was the most opportune time for the Riders. Conversely, the Lions didn't hold the Riders when they had the chance to on a couple of occasions, giving up that valuable field position. Sometimes it is a game of inches, today it was a game of yards, and the Lions didn't contain them when they needed to most.

[SammyGreene]

OUR GAME PLAN-A RETURN TO 'CHAP BALL'

It was wonderful this season to watch a balanced, diversified offensive attack. It was a treat to see the two back set at times, using Smith at fullback and Ian Smart at tailback on the counter toss and quick pitch. It was great to see Lyle Green line up at fullback and Smith at tailback to run counters and off-tackle plays. It was exciting to see a passing attack that challenged defenses vertically. It was thrilling to see us bootleg Jarious Jackson and move him around to put pressure on a defense.

I have no idea what happened in the last couple of games of the season and especially today except that I do know that we returned to the Chap Ball version of our offense. We started to go almost exclusively to the single back set with rare exception. We started to throw those crossing patterns way too often again. Think back to the last couple of games and the number of times that Clermont has been almost killed running crossing patterns against underneath zone defenses. We started to over focus on the underneath crossing pattern game again. We had been a dynamic running team that used play action to set up the vertical passing game. Suddenly they were thrown out the window.

We decreased our run variety towards the end of the season, stopped running the football as much, and stopped using play action and bootlegs. It was like the Chap, fired in Edmonton, was secretly running our offence again.

Suddenly the quarterback sacks were back in the last game, we were throwing every pass out of the pocket, and we had become bland and predictable after not being that way all season. The Riders were all over our crossing patterns today and our receivers were tightly covered all game. Down by 3 points at the half we completely moved away from our running game and went to a nickel and dime passing offence that isn’t going to get it done, in terms of scoring, in today’s CFL!!

Watching today's game felt like 2005 all over again.... the scary thing was just how well our receivers were covered today... almost like the Riders knew what was coming on every down. Abandoning the running game in the 2nd half made no sense, especially with DD at quarterback and the Riders coming hard after him.

Also don't understand why we weren't moving the pocket around and taking advantage of Jackson's athleticism. The Lions had two weeks to add a couple of wrinkles, regardless of who their WF opponent was going to be.

The Lions went deep twice today... once to Boden, who looked over his wrong shoulder and the other to Jackson who was behind coverage but slightly overthrown. Rodgers is supposedly the fastest player on the team but not once did he test the Rider secondary deep. What also baffles me now was why did Wally opt to sit Rodgers out for the Calgary game (in favour of Ortiz) when cleary he is a work in progress and could have used the work for some added confidence.

Just seemed like Kruck/Dorazio were schooled today by Richie Hall.

[Blitz]

good analysis Blitz, I think the major turning point for the Lions was in the second half when instead of conceding a safety, Wally chose to have McCallum punt from the goal line area. Riders the took that possession in for a TD (from around the BC 50), then after the kickoff DD was sacked and fumbled basically a 8 point gain for the riders where a safety would have been 2 points and major field position change.

I agree and didn't mention it so glad you did Wildthing. It just created another short field for the Riders. You can't expect a defense to be on the field that many times (we shut them down on 11 drives) and have that kind of field postion and continue to shut them down. Considering four turnovers, six Rider drives that began in our own end, plus the time of possession we did a good job of only giving up 26 points.

Sometimes it is a game of inches, today it was a game of yards, and the Lions didn't contain them when they needed to most.
_________________

True Rammer but we really needed our offence to score some points in the second half outside of the Smart kickoff return. It was the only time we were in scoring postition.

Watching today's game felt like 2005 all over again.... the scary thing was just how well our receivers were covered today... almost like the Riders knew what was coming on every down. Abandoning the running game in the 2nd half made no sense, especially with DD at quarterback and the Riders coming hard after him.

Also don't understand why we weren't moving the pocket around and taking advantage of Jackson's athleticism. The Lions had two weeks to add a couple of wrinkles, regardless of who their WF opponent was going to be.

We were so predictable. They zoned us underneath and were all over our crossing patterns. We did nothing in the two week layoff to add new wrinkles. In fact we were so bland. We did the same thing in 2005, when we played Edmonton and the Eskimos were jumping our routes.

We went away from those crossing routes for most of this season and only used them occasionally. We never used the toss, today, the counter toss, or any of our running plays except the zone run. Of course we only ran 8 times. We were only down 3 points.

I don't know if we created our offence for this game for Dickenson to come in or what but we got away from all the things that made us successful this season. The two back set, the vertical game, play action, bootlegs etc. With Dickenson in there they knew we weren't going to run the football much and he would be in the pocket and they just teed off!!

We ran the same dam stuff we ran in the 2005 Western Final. I don't mind losing but I hate losing when we don't learn from past experience. We changed our whole offensive philosophy this year and then went back to Chap Ball during our last two games of the season and especially for this playoff game. It made absolutely no sense to me!!

[Don Miller]

You could tell the Lions were not as hungry as they were at last years final. They looked rusty and out of sync. JJ was throwing the ball hard and high although at least two of the throws should have been caught. Ian Smart fumbled the punt and away our momentum went to Sask. We kept trying to come back but were losing the field advantage and our defence were out there far too long. The medium routes again proved to be a problem for our linebackers and db's when we did not get enough pressure on Joseph. Brent Johnson was nearly invisible and had an off year. Cam Wake was our best pass rusher today and most of the year. Javy Glatt did not really come back strong after his injury. Sask played better for sure but giving any team the turnovers we gave, we should't have won. Hard to repeat for sure in any sport but we had a chance. Next season the league will have even more parity I am sure and it will be a dogfight again in the West.

[MacNews]

Rodgers is supposedly the fastest player on the team but not once did he test the Rider secondary deep.

I've been asking that all season long.

[No Ordinary Joe]

I agree with every point that's been raised in this thread so far.

Not running the ball and making our offence one-dimensional hurt us. I don't know why Kruck and Dorazio went back to the same game plan that got us embarrassed on our home turf back in August. Joe Smith rushed the ball 8 times tonight and the only decent drive we had tonight was when he was involved. We were never behind far enough that abandoning the running game should have been considered an option, we were always within striking distance and I thought we should have kept with it.

Sticking with Dave Dickenson and not returning to Jarious Jackson also cost us. I agreed with Dave coming in when he did because Jarious really was struggling up to that point, however, Jarious was also having similar struggles in Regina back in September and he had a great 2nd half and led us to a huge victory that made today's game possible. When it was clear that Dave was not getting the protection necessary for him to be successful, Wally should have put Jarious back in in the hopes that somebody more mobile under center could have made another play or two to perhaps make things different.

Our Defence had a great game IMO but weren't able to get that key stop to force a punt when we needed it and the lack of turnovers created also hurt. If we could have forced a punt or picked off a pass to eliminate one of those 'Rider scoring drives we would have put ourselves in a much better position to win this game.

Cam Wake was a monster today. But our front four didn't do much as a whole. I think what they tried to do was to have a controlled rush so that Kerry Joseph wouldn't be forced to pull down the ball and run, that makes sense but KJ still had a couple of plays where he picked up yardage with his feet. It would have been nice to get a couple more sacks on him, there were a couple of times where I thought he should have wrapped up and wasn't and then he was able to elude the pass rusher and make a play to move the chains.

Our O-Line needed to play much better. It killed us to lose both Sherko and Valli, I feel bad for Lorne Plante, he must have felt sick having to go into this game for his first action of the year. Why we didn't run left behind Murphy still baffles me.

We got out-coached, out-hit and out-played in virtually every facet of the game and that sunk us. Ian Smart needs to learn how to hang on to the football. 7 fumbles, 4 lost this year. Unacceptable.

[stansz]

okay i purposedly didnt omce on this site rite after ....know ive ahd sometime to calm down and think....

our offense looked as if it had the chap coaching again....very few deep throws, lots of crosing stuff....

i didnt really agree with the decision with pull jjack...he has been more of a 2nd half qb...i think u stick him in there a little longer

our D played well enough for us to win i think.....i think back to all those short fields the riders had to work with and only coming away with 3 points....i think thye held their own

i really dont know why smith wastn more involved.....sure we are playing the leagues top run D..but u gotta involve ur best player

props to smart for coming bak with two huge returns after the fumble

cam wake!!!! wat a game..too bad

im gonan go ahead and venture that walby is a riders fan? i mean most evident was when clermont got levelled..got bak up and walked off but then hunt was still woozy walby says smthing to the effect of "warrior of the game rite there" ...

jsut some random rants i had...overall tho i agreat year i think..think about the revolving door qb situtation.....think about how we lost our entire weakside defense for a few games.....

[Rammer]

I wonder how the Lions got called for roughing the passer when he was over the line of scrimmage, that would have made him a runner and susceptible to being hit, correct? Then to top it off, the Riders get a first down out of a second and 19 yards or so from it, after the two penalties are decided....someone is going to have to explain that one to me.

[stansz]

hahaha funny thought...walby mentioned that it was a shot to the head to KJ and thats why it was called

then i remmeber they played the clip of the perry hit on DD ...if i wasnt mistakened....that was similar no ??cept no mention by walby

dotn get me wrong..full props to the riders..but i really hate walby..i had to mute the tv at times today

[Lions4ever]

I wonder how the Lions got called for roughing the passer when he was over the line of scrimmage, that would have made him a runner and susceptible to being hit, correct? Then to top it off, the Riders get a first down out of a second and 19 yards or so from it, after the two penalties are decided....someone is going to have to explain that one to me.

Correct. You can't have an illegal forward pass penalty call and a roughing the passer call on the same play. It is conceptually impossible. However, this crew leapt the conceptual impossibility chasm on that one. Only in the CFL I guess...Unbelievable.

[TheLionKing]

I agree with Blitz's analysis of the offence. It was too vanilla. The Lions played right into Sask's hands when they kept Dickenson in the pocket when they had Lorne Plante in at right guard. The smart move in my opinion is to have a mobile quarterback in there to escape the rush. At the very least they should have Dickenson rolled away from the rush and have some counter plays to keep them the Riders from pinning their ears back and rush.