Some Bombers erased painful memories with Grey Cup victory

Paul LaPolice experienced a flashback Sunday.

When he arrived at Calgary’s McMahon Stadium for the 2019 Grey Cup game, the Winnipeg Blue Bombers’ offensive co-ordinator momentarily was back in 2009, when he was employed by the Saskatchewan Roughriders.

Saskatchewan lost the ’09 Grey Cup game to the Montreal Alouettes at McMahon thanks to the 13th man, a penalty for too many men on the field that gave Montreal’s Damon Duval another chance at a game-winning field goal.

On Sunday, as LaPolice got to the stadium for another Grey Cup game, he remembered the events of 10 years earlier.

“When the bus dropped us off (Sunday), I had a memory of ’09 (of) the bus leaving and the horrible feeling we had of losing the Grey Cup and how we lost the Grey Cup,” LaPolice said after Sunday’s contest. “There were three or four fans outside the bus still saying, ‘We love you, we love you.’

“Thank God we changed that script for us in Winnipeg.”

LaPolice exorcised that demon — at least to some extent — when the Bombers thrashed the Hamilton Tiger-Cats 33-12 in Sunday’s CFL final.

One of the lasting memories from the 2009 game is the video of LaPolice slamming down his ball cap in the Roughriders’ coaches box after the penalty was announced. That was on his mind as he prepared for Sunday’s contest.

“I did tell the TSN guys, ‘Let’s make a different fricking video to show of (me) up in this booth, please,’ ” LaPolice said with a chuckle. “Hopefully they have one.

“(The 2009 and 2019 games were) very similar, if you think about it. In 2009, Montreal was 15-and-3 and they had the best defence and everything. We had lost to them both times in (Saskatchewan) and we went out and beat the hell out of them (in the Grey Cup), but we didn’t finish the game. We finished the game (Sunday).”

Prior to Sunday, the Bombers hadn’t won a Grey Cup title since 1990.

This post-season, they had to go on the road to beat the Calgary Stampeders in the West Division semifinal and the Roughriders in the West final. The Bombers completed their playoff run with a dominant victory over a Hamilton team that had posted a 15-3-0 record in the regular season.

“We’ve been the underdogs for the last four weeks (and) we wanted it to be the same way (Sunday),” said defensive end Willie Jefferson, who signed with Winnipeg in the off-season after spending three seasons with Saskatchewan.

“We didn’t want nobody to bet on us. We wanted them to bet against us. That’s what they’ve been doing and we wanted to show the CFL that if you bet against us, that’s what you’re going to get.”

People doubted the Bombers for much of the 2019 season, thanks to events such as a season-ending injury to starting quarterback Matt Nichols, a two-game PED suspension to tailback Andrew Harris and the acquisition of concussion-prone quarterback Zach Collaros.

Harris starred in Sunday’s game — he was named the game’s most valuable player and most valuable Canadian — and Collaros completed his season-long comeback with a solid outing in the CFL final.

The pivot suffered a concussion on the third offensive play of his first game of the season on June 13, when he was Saskatchewan’s starter. He was traded July 31 to the Toronto Argonauts, who dealt him to Winnipeg on Oct. 9.

His 2019 journey ended with a Grey Cup title.

“That’s what it’s about — mental toughness,” Collaros said. “That was instilled in me growing up for sure, through my parents, through my coaches, through my teachers. (There was) no sense of entitlement. Everything is earned.”

“What an unbelievable story,” Regina-born guard Patrick Neufeld added when asked about his quarterback. “The Zach Collaros Revenge Tour finished off with a championship. I can’t say enough about how great of a teammate he was.”

Neufeld got his own sort of redemption.

He was traded by his hometown Roughriders in 2013 before they won the Grey Cup, a move that he admits was tough to swallow. On Sunday, he finally got to savour a league championship.

“Adversity builds character and we went through a lot of it this year,” Neufeld said. “We know there’s always light at the end of that tunnel and we just kept clearing the way.

“We trusted each other and we just knew that, at the end of this season, we wanted to be champions and we were determined as hell.”

Richie Hall won the fourth Grey Cup of his career Sunday and said it was just as special as the previous three.

But the Bombers’ defensive co-ordinator had to be more emotional this time, given that his younger brother, Michael, died in October. Richie Hall took a leave of absence from the Bombers during the regular season and missed two games.

Hall admitted he thought of Michael during Grey Cup week.

“I know he’s jumping in heaven, him and my mom,” said Hall, a former Roughriders defensive back and assistant coach. “I’m so happy just getting here — and to win it in the fashion that we did, it’s so special for him.”

— With files from 980 CJME’s Jamie Nye