From the Lions' Den

Bye week means a few things, among them an opportunity to heal up, retool game plans, brush up on execution, and maybe head home to see the relatives. It also usually means having to shake off the rust upon the first game back. Or so the conventional wisdom says, anyway.

As we return to the beautiful stadium on the side of the mountain, our heroes have just returned from said bye week, and are theoretically covered in Ferrous Oxide, which may or may not need to be mechanically removed.

Lions took the field against the winless in 3Alouettes, in their nest. The opening drive by Anthony Calvillo was precision itself, and resulted in a field goal, and should have meant a major score. Not a good start for a rusty Lions Defence.

Then the wheels came off for the Als, while the Lions engaged the turbos. Dave Dickenson went down in the second quarter with another ankle injury, and to the rescue came Lions #2 quarterback Buck Pierce, once again forced into action by injury to DD.

The Offence moved the ball briskly, and the Defence was overpowering in its mastery of Anthony Calvillo and crew. Once again, a Lion TD featured the now almost familiar combination of Buck Pierce to Brent Johnson, while Slotback Geroy Simon kept up his torrid pace, passing the 1,000 yard mark in Game 11. Should he keep this up, he could very easily outdo his own record of 1,750 yards in 2004. Also featuring on Offence was Slotback/Tight End (?) Jason Clermont, who caught a TD pass early in the first quarter to put the Lions ahead in the game for good. Another positive was a game plan that worked very well, and an ability to adjust at halftime that had been missing up to this point of the season.

On Defence, the front four seemed to keep Anthony Calvillo back on his heels for much of the game, and the linebackers stepped up superbly to keep Robert Edwards contained for the most part. Secondary play featured an Interception by Korey Banks, and good coverage for the most part by Lion dbs. Special Teams played well too, with excellent punt coverage, and good downfield presence, when the inevitable No Yards flags are taken into account.

Next is another bye week for BC, where the rust will again have a chance to form, and the guests at the Dome on Sept. 16^th will be these very same Alouettes.

They will be decidedly unhappy, after brooding over losing at home, and then thinking more about said loss during their own bye week. Should be a great one.