MONTREAL – The Montreal Alouettes may have been down, but they proved they were never out as they came from behind, a double-digit deficit, to defeat the Calgary Stampeders 30-26 in front of their home crowd at Percival Molson Memorial Stadium on Saturday night.
I didn’t get to watch this game but only 106 passing yards for Jake? I’m surprised the score was so close.
Calgary forced turnovers in the first half and utilized backup QB Stevens on sneaks and trick plays to grind down the field. Credit to them. But the Als held them to 3 points in the second half and mounted a big 4th-quarter comeback.
Maier passes sideways a lot it seems
4th quarter was kinda like a different game
He’s not a bad QB. But Calgary was playing on the road, missing some key players, against a superior team. I’m also not particularly wowed by their receiving corps. It feels like the team thinks Begelton is a better receiver than he currently is.
Maier has had a good year so far with a good number of deep passes. I assume the short passes were because the deep passes weren’t open. It almost worked for Calgary but the Montreal defence buckled down when it needed to and the Calgary defense couldn’t contain the Montreal offense in the final quarter. That said the Montreal defense played solid all game and had to contend with defending on short fields because of Montreal turnovers so the 14 point lead Calgary had at one point wasn’t indicative of their play.
The Als are the class of the league right now. Despite some miscues, they are just better on both sides of the ball.
Can’t say I was a Fajardo fan or Maas but hats off to both of them. They’ve earned everything they’ve got.
Stamps? I don’t know. Maier has looked great one game, then not so great. Next week’s game with the Bombers might tell us a lot about both those clubs.
I wasn’t a fan of either man but they have both proved me very wrong. Maas has learned to control his temper and empower the people around him. Cody has improved dramatically on his ability to check down and distribute the ball. Perhaps in part thanks to coach AC.
Non-Als fans might not know this, but Cody apparently put a lot of work into improving his deep ball in the 2023 offseason. He says he watched film and saw his receivers getting open downfield a lot, and wanted to take advantage. He also came into camp about 10 lbs. lighter than when he started 2023, which gave him confidence to take off and run for first downs when needed.
Maier isn’t a bad QB. But he’s not playing on a team with all-world talent so his deficiencies are always going to stand out. Having said that, the final interception he threw was not great at all. Vercheval on the RDS broadcast rightly took him to task for it. It was second and ONE. He could have run for a first down and gotten a fresh series. He had a receiver open on the sidelines. But he threw, on the run, across his body, to the middle of the field. A recipe for disaster and Ruffin made him pay.
It was far worse in reality… Quite a few of his passes were under 3 yard in the air… YAC added greatly to the 106 total.
Yet to the stamps credit, they could have easily won this game. They needed ONE critical stop on the fourth quarters but could not pull it off.
I said earlier the Stamps were not yet ready for prime time but they are so freaking close and the season is very early
They will certainly challenge for the playoffs and have a very good chance to again be in the show.
One guy catching the ball alone cannot be a dangerous part of the game if the other team knows nobody else is going be looked at when the pass is coming. Begelton IS that good. But he needs the supporting cast to contribute too.
The last two seasons Cody was in Sask he had no confidence his receivers were going to catch any pass and ge also had on average less than 0.02 seconds to find a receiver before more than three 230 pound D linemen were on top of his rib cage. Look at Cody now with a proper supporting cast in front of him.
Begelton has what, a mediocre at best QB and not much else other than a great kicking game and a good run game. He needs more … It is a team sport for a reason and one single great player never makes any team really good without at least a few other great players to work fogether
A lot of the guys in Montreal team and staff are people that got unfairly criticized.
While yes you can say mass was a hot head at Edmonton I will also say since mass has left the team the elks have been a directionless mess who can’t buy a win even if their life depends on it.
Cody while yeah he had worked a lot the criticism he was getting was also really not on him, riders never bothered to protect him and those issues are still rampant now as we can see with Harris.
Also clearly are trying to protect Cody and mass is clearly part of a more stable and well run org compare to at Edmonton and his short stint at Saskatchewan.
Even Calvillo was getting a lot of hate that now seems to be all swept under the couch, the only guy on that als team that didn’t get a lot of hate and criticism is the goat Thorpe ( who I hope never gets picked by any team as their coach ).
Thorpe has come in for a lot of criticism over the years, believe me. IMO some of it was warranted but most of it wasn’t. Right now, he’s been given the personnel he needs to run a top defence and that’s the difference. You can’t coach talent.
Danny Maciocia is the biggest unsung hero and most responsible for the success of the current Als team.
He also perpetually has never gotten the credit he deserved too.
Despite the lack of respect the guy has proven he knows a tonne of what it takes to do the job and succeed
Yep, I was one of the many who didn’t like the Maciocia hire, based on how his tenure in Edmonton ended. But he slowly won me over by rebuilding the draft, making some solid picks, and most importantly, surrounding himself with a great group of assistants and empowering them to do their job. It’s not just Maciocia: it’s Deslauriers, Edme, Lavergne, Archambault, and now Desjardins again.
I haven’t always agreed with the moves he’s made, but there is no denying now that he’s built a winner in Montreal.
Montreal has stolen WPG’s team confidence in that they always believe the game will be won, and find a way to get it done. Their D sure is fun to watch, and I’m envious.
Hopefully WPG can find that again.
So you’re the green one.
I have never been envious of anyone or anything since seeing the movie Se7en.
They’ve drafted some pretty good guys too. 
Philpot & Dequoy easily come to mind.
Yes, and I was talking about this on the Als forum the other day. The number of draft picks playing key roles on the team is nice to see.
Dequoy, Lestage, Dallaire, Philpot, Julien-Grant, Cantin-Arku, Uguak (who isn’t here now but played an important role in the 2023 Cup win). Scouting is on point.
"I wasn’t a fan of either man but they have both proved me very wrong. "
That goes double for me. I’m a believer now. How often have the Als managed to win by outcoaching the opposition. Especially in the Toronto game, but all season. Cody has been fantastic, especially starting week two when he completed two long passes that were not under thrown and has been great throwing the ball downfield since.
