The Saskatchewan Roughriders would like to make it 3 years in a row where the Grey Cup champion celebrates on home turf. The 2013 Grey Cup will be in Regina on November 24; this year, the game will be before the U.S. Thanksgiving, so make your travel plans accordingly.
The CFL was very unbalanced based on last year's standings. Only 3 of the 8 teams were above .500 and none of those won the Grey Cup. 2 teams finished below .500 and made the playoffs. No East Division team outscored its opponents. Going into the last 2 weeks of the season, Hamilton had a scenario where it would host a playoff game with a below .500 record.
The 9-9 Toronto Argonauts got hot at the right time, aided by a Calgary upset of B.C. in the West Division Final, to win the 100th Grey Cup.
So let's look at where the CFL is in 2013.
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Canadians can watch all the games on TSN. Any talk that the CBC would pick up some telecasts was just that … talk. RDS will carry Montréal Alouettes regular-season games and the playoffs in French.
As for the U.S., NBC Sports Network has a regular season package (14) along with the division finals and the Grey Cup. ESPN2 has a 5-game series of early season telecasts. Otherwise, ESPN3 will have the other games; check your cable/Internet provider. The CFL Web site run encapsulated video summaries of each game.
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Two teams will play in different stadiums this year. The Winnipeg Blue Bombers have a new stadium — Investors Group Field — replacing the long-time home Canad Inns Stadium. You might remember that the Blue Bombers were supposed to move in during the 2012 season, but construction delays prevented that from happening. Investors Group Field is the first new CFL stadium since SkyDome in 1989.
The Blue Bombers kick off the entire CFL season, hosting the Montréal Alouettes on Thursday.
The Hamilton Tiger-Cats still represent the Steel City, yet their home games will be in Guelph. The Tiger-Cats will also host the Touchdown Atlantic classic in Moncton, hosting the Alouettes. The Battle of Ontario will not be part of the CFL Labour Day experience.
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The Edmonton offense will lead the Life of Reilly, now that Matt Nichols is out for the season. Preseason games aren't meaningless when your team suffers a major injury, as Nichols did when he tore his ACL.
The Esks brought in Mike Reilly from B.C. in the off-season. That move may save the season for Edmonton.
Kevin Joseph will likely be the Esks backup, but Reilly will get every opportunity to produce for Edmonton.
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Toronto signed former NFL wide receiver Mike Williams. Geroy Simon went from orange in B.C. to green in Saskatchewan. We mentioned Mike Reilly's move from B.C. to Edmonton. Anthony Calvillo has some firepower in the Alouettes huddle with Canadian running back Jerome Messam and former Argo, TiCat, Blue Bomber, and Lion slotback Arland Bruce III. Quinton Porter was brought in to compete for the backup quarterback spot, but under the new regime, never felt like he had a shot. Calvillo can use some help in the backup role.
The Hamilton Tiger-Cats put WR Chris Williams on the suspended list over a contract dispute. Williams wanted to get out of his CFL contract to make the jump to the NFL.
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Dan Hawkins has pretty large shoes to fill in Montréal with the departure of Marc Trestman to the NFL Chicago Bears. At Trestman's news conference in Chicago, this was the first time I had ever seen his hair. At least he has some hair. The other coaching change is Kent Austin is back in the league. The one-time Saskatchewan Grey Cup winning coach will roam the sidelines in Guelph for the Tiger-Cats.
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One new quirk where timeouts are concerned. Teams can spend both timeouts as they wish, except that they can't spend both in the last 3 minutes of the 2nd half. Still nice that they only get 2 timeouts for the whole game.
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