Can you feel the ESPN withdrawal?
This is CFL withdrawal week for U.S. viewers without a ESPN telecast for the first time all season. We knew August was going to be rough, but we've seen our last TV telecast of the CFL in the States until Labour Day. We've had 8 of the minimum 17 telecasts so far. All the games are available on ESPN3 for those who have access.
Winnipeg draws the Thursday game, hosting its archrival Saskatchewan. The Blue Bombers have a quick turnaround playing in Toronto on Tuesday.
In the Friday night doubleheader, Edmonton comes off the bye to travel to Molson Stadium to take on the Montréal Alouettes. The late game has the Tiger-Cats in Vancouver.
The RedBlacks make their way west to Calgary in the lone Saturday night game.
Toronto gets the bye, but will draw 2 home games in less than a week.
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TSN
Thursday
Saskatchewan @ Winnipeg, 8:30p
Friday
Edmonton @ Montréal, 7p
Hamilton @ BC, 10p
Saturday
Ottawa @ Calgary, 7:30p
Bye week
Toronto
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TSN changed the dynamic for covering the second Hamilton home game in less than a week. We were truly on top of the action like we haven't seen outside a Grey Cup. Really enjoyed the intimacy from the camera angles.
Even with a 6,500 crowd on Thursday night, the U.S. TV audience missed an amazing game. Winnipeg jumps out early, dominating the first half. Hamilton scores 23 straight points, yet the Blue Bombers pull off a late drive, winning the game with the extra point with no time remaining.
Close contests haven't dominated the ESPN games, but that was as exciting at the end as you can imagine.
Winnipeg is playing well, especially on the road. Sure the team blew a big lead, but showed heart to pull off that comeback. Drew Willy has this team believing.
As for the Tiger-Cats, you have to wonder if this temporary home isn't helping. We know the August 16 game against Calgary will be at Ron Joyce Stadium, marking 3 home games before getting to play at Tim Hortons Field.
We'll have more of this in a special article on Monday.
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Other than the Hamilton games at 6,500 people, the only CFL games to be sold out are both of Ottawa's home games. Opening Night drew 24,326 and last week's game against Saskatchewan had an attendance of 24,303. TD Place is the second smallest capacity field in the league, ahead of Tim Hortons Field in Hamilton. Ottawa needed to send a message that the city is behind the RedBlacks and 2 straight sellouts is a great start.
The back-to-back sellouts made me jump online to buy my ticket for the Edmonton game on August 15. There were not many seats left; thank goodness only 1 seat was needed. We will have a lot more on that game online when I return.
I'm not a big fan of the trend of building smaller stadiums. Hamilton did well in Ivor Wynne Stadium, which held just under 30,000. Now fewer Tiger-Cats fans will get to go to games.
Seemingly, Ottawa would rather sell out at 24,000 instead of having 27,000 in a 30,000 seat stadium. Smaller capacities make CFL tickets more valuable, pushing up the prestige. Sounds more like marketing BS in a league that is refreshing light on BS.
Moncton struggled to get 16,000 for last fall's Touchdown Atlantic game, but the city and region don't have their own team and a less than ideal stadium.
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Zubin Mehenti handled the halftime duties for the ESPNews break. We didn't get any pregame coverage since the Argos-Alouettes game ran late. Spoiler alert since we got the final score from the first game.
The ESPNews break didn't start or finish with CFL highlights, but placed that in the middle. We did get highlights from the Thursday night game in Hamilton and the first game on Friday from Molson Stadium.
The U.S. feed didn't get to see any of the coverage from the TSN studio.
Kevin Glenn won his first game as a visitor to McMahon Stadium with his 4th non-Calgary team. Bo Levi Mitchell didn't get to set the record for best start. And now we have no undefeated CFL teams.
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Latest on the ESPN2 CFL ratings ... got these numbers second-hand, but they probably are correct.
The Battle of Alberta came in at 189,000 viewers with the Saturday game of Toronto in Saskatchewan coming in at 150,000.
These numbers are falling a bit, but perhaps the late night starts aren't helping. The West is playing the better football right now. The Alouettes haven't done much, but we haven't seen Chad Johnson on ESPN since Week 1 in Calgary.
With the TV games going away for a month, ESPN will have to regain momentum for the CFL telecasts.
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Even though the Ottawa RedBlacks were blown out by the Saskatchewan Roughriders, the teams provided some exceptional excitement. An 111-yard TD return by Tristan Jackson off a missed FG by Ottawa's Brett Maher would normally be the most intriguing play.
RedBlacks backup QB Thomas DeMarco was in on a 3rd-and-3 call. DeMarco quick punted the ball, the punt ended up going 73 yards into the end zone where it was recovered by WR Dobson Collins for a touchdown.
You can recover a punt on offense if you are behind the punter when the ball is punted. Collins scored the first RedBlacks TD on home turf.
Calgary's Scott McKenzie was the last to score on an onside kick touchdown in 1999.
This was new to me; another exciting way to score in the CFL. I hope that highlight made it to ESPN.
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Toronto-Montréal is exciting, regardless of the sport. In the CFL, you have to go back to 1981 for the last time both teams were at least 2 games under .500.
The Als have scored 10 points in their last 2 games. Not 10 points per game; 10 points for the 2 games.
Montreal fired its offensive coordinator before the season started and didn't fully replace him. Ryan Dinwiddie has been serving as the offensive coordinator, but he isn't ready for the job. The team has brought in some great consultants, but Turk Schonert and Jeff Garcia aren't suiting up to play.
Tom Higgins hadn't coached in 6 years and he has one hand tied behind his back for his offense.
Montreal has scored 75 points in its 5 games, and only has 1 win. The East is bad this year, but the Alouettes are an especially high level of bad.
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Chris Cuthbert and Glen Suitor stayed in the East in Hamilton and Ottawa. Rod Black and Duane Forde called the game in Montréal while Gord Miller and Matt Dunigan handled the game in Calgary.
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