Grey Cup

Saturday November 18, 2023

As November's gloomy weather and distressing news dominate headlines, the arrival of the Canadian Football League's Grey Cup in Hamilton becomes a much-needed and joyous diversion, offering a week-long celebration filled with free events, music, sports, and community engagement.

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday November 18, 2023

Grey Cup Fever: A Welcome Escape from November’s Gloom”

September 8, 2020

As the chill of November settles in, bringing with it the gloom of dreary weather and the weight of troubling news, Canadians find solace and excitement in the arrival of the Canadian Football League’s (CFL) Grey Cup. The coveted trophy has made its way to Hamilton, setting the stage for the championship clash between Winnipeg and Montreal on Sunday, Nov. 19.

In a time when headlines are dominated by war, inflation, conflict, and a cost of living crisis, the Grey Cup festivities offer a much-needed diversion. The city of Hamilton is gearing up for a week-long celebration, with events scattered across town, promising entertainment and joy for everyone.

While the Hamilton Tiger-Cats won’t be vying for the 110th Grey Cup after being eliminated by Montreal, the game on Sunday is just one part of the spectacle. The CFL has orchestrated a series of events, many of which are free, ensuring that the entire community can join in on the excitement.

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The festivities kick off with the Grey Cup’s grand entrance on His Majesty’s Canadian Ship (HMCS) Harry DeWolf. Although the ship’s arrival is exclusive to the media, the official Grey Cup arrival ceremony, set against the backdrop of the Arctic-defending vessel, is open to all onlookers at HMCS Star Naval Reserve Division.

One of the week’s highlights is the CFL Fan Central, reminiscent of the popular Supercrawl, taking over James Street N. from Thursday at 11 a.m. This event promises a vibrant atmosphere with a beer garden, food trucks, inflatables, a Christmas market, giveaways, games, and more.

For those seeking a taste of Calgary Stampede without leaving Hamilton, the Calgary Grey Cup Committee is hosting a free breakfast on James Street on Friday and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Meanwhile, a community race involving 2,000 students will see them sprint from Gage Park to Tim Hortons Field, adding a touch of youthful enthusiasm to the festivities.

Music enthusiasts are in for a treat with the kickoff to the music festival on Thursday, featuring local talent like The Dirty Nil and Montreal’s NOBRO. The music festival, running from Friday to Saturday, promises a diverse lineup of performances, offering a respite from the anxieties of the outside world.

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November 1, 2022

Beyond the game itself, fans have the opportunity to interact with CFL players, get autographs, and capture memorable moments with the Grey Cup at the Canadian Football League Players’ Association headquarters.

Even the annual Hamilton Santa Claus Parade is getting a Grey Cup twist, as CFL cheer teams and the trophy itself become part of the spectacle. As the parade weaves through the streets of downtown Hamilton, festival-themed giveaways will add an extra layer of cheer to the event.

Sports enthusiasts can head to the John Weir Foote Armoury on James Street N. to witness the Hamilton Flag Football Classic—a three-day tournament featuring teams from across southern Ontario and the chance to meet CFL alumni.

The week concludes with the CFL’s 2023 awards ceremony at the Fallsview Casino Resort in Niagara Falls, providing a glamorous setting for recognizing outstanding achievements in Canadian football.

In a world filled with uncertainties, the Grey Cup festivities serve as a welcome distraction, offering a chance for the community to come together, celebrate, and momentarily escape the weight of November’s gloom. So, as the Grey Cup takes center stage, let us embrace the joy it brings and revel in the shared experience of a much-needed diversion. (AI)

 

Saturday December 11, 2021

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday December 11, 2021

Fans feeling the love, excitement as CFL’s premier game set to kick off

Chants of “Oskee Wee Wee” are echoing through Hamilton, the streets flooded with CFL jerseys from across the country and rival fans are taking part in some good-natured ribbing.

It’s Grey Cup Sunday and the energy surrounding the biggest game in Canadian football can be felt around much of the city.

“The excitement, the fans, the crowds. It’s just going to be an amazing game,” said Pam Broadley who’s been cheering for the home team, Hamilton Tiger-Cats, for two decades.

The Ticats take on the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at 6 p.m. ET.

It’s a rematch of the last time the Grey Cup was awarded in 2019, in Calgary, after last season was cancelled amid the COVID-19 pandemic. (CBC) 

 

Friday November 28, 2014

Friday November 28, 2014Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday November 28, 2014

Rare football double-double brewing in Hamilton this weekend

(By Scott Radley) It was a brisk November Saturday in Winnipeg — aren’t they all? — when the undefeated, second-ranked McMaster Marauders showed up to go head-to-head with the Manitoba Bisons in a Canadian university semifinal game. The next day, it was the Tiger-Cats’ turn as they visited the hometown Blue Bombers in the Canadian Football League’s East final.

Nobody at the time was thinking much about geography and how it might be awhile until a similar story could be told again.

Yet it turns out that weekend 13 years ago was the last time a city hosted a CFL and interuniversity semifinal on the same weekend and won them both. Meaning the McMaster Marauders and Hamilton Tiger-Cats have a chance to do something incredibly special this weekend.

Tuesday, November 19, 2013On Saturday at 4 p.m., the Marauders will take on the Mount Allison Mounties in the Mitchell Bowl at Ron Joyce Stadium. The winner goes to the Vanier Cup to play for the national championship in Montreal. The next day at 1 p.m., the Ticats face the Montreal Alouettes at Tim Hortons Field. Winner goes to the Grey Cup in Vancouver.

Win them both and this city will kick off one of the great weeks of football anticipation and pigskin partying this country has ever seen.

“It would be one hell of a week in Hamilton,” Ticat legend Angelo Mosca says.

A handful of Canadian cities have attempted to pull the home-victory double since Winnipeg last did it. As recently as 2013, Calgary hosted both games. While the University of Calgary Dinos advanced, the Stampeders lost. Just as had happened in 2010. In 2002, the Alouettes won when the double took place in Montreal, but McGill lost.

There have been other permutations and combinations. Cities have had their two teams play on the same weekend, but not both at home. Cities have had their two teams win the semis but on different weekends. But it’s been a while since the stars aligned and both hosts won and advanced to their championship games within 24 hours of each other.

It’s already a huge deal. Amazingly, there’s more.

Adding an exclamation mark to Hamilton’s claim as Footballtown or Gridironland or whatever the souvenir T-shirt manufacturers might come up with, is the fact that next week this city is hosting the OFSAA Bowls. Nine high school provincial championships will be played at Ron Joyce Stadium, three each on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. (Continued: Hamilton Spectator)

 

SOCIAL MEDIA

 

Saturday, November 23, 2013

Saturday, November 23, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, November 23, 2013

In the Grey Cup, the going gets rough for Saskatchewan

For SaleIf this were the Banjo Bowl, you’d have to like the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ chances.

But, traditionally, this team comes up small in Grey Cup games.
There, somebody had to say it.

Nothing against the fans, they’re among the best in any sport, and they’ll have Mosaic Stadium rocking on Sunday in the 101st Grey Cup game in Regina against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.

As for the previous 100 Grey Cup games, the Roughies were there 18 times.

They won three. That’s it.

The Roughriders did win the Cup as recently as 2007, but the competition was only  the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, their rivals from the Banjo Bowl, so named since 2004 when Bombers kicker Troy Westwood said people from Regina were “a bunch of banjo-pickin’ inbreds.”

Roughriders fans have taken the insult in good humour — besides, they know Tiger-Cats fans have been called far worse.

For the record:

The Roughriders organization, formed in 1910, originally was known as the Regina Rugby Club. The RRC lost its only Grey Cup appearance, 54-0 to Queen’s University in 1923.

In 1924, they were renamed the Regina Roughriders, losers of six Grey Cups including five in a row from 1928 through 1932, among them three losses to the Hamilton Tigers.

In 1946, they became the Saskatchewan Roughriders, who are 3-8 in Grey Cup games, including losing two of three to the Tiger-Cats.
The Roughriders have won the Cup in 1966, 1989 and 2007.

The Tiger-Cats were founded in 1950 with the merger of the Hamilton Tigers and Hamilton Wildcats.

The Ticats are 8-10 since in Grey Cup appearances. Some fans also claim the seven earlier Cup wins by the Tigers (5-2), Flying Wildcats (1-1) and Hamilton Alerts (1-0), but purists say no way, claiming those were different organizations.

The Tiger-Cats have won the Cup in 1953, 1957, 1963, 1965, 1967, 1972, 1986 and 1999.

 Head to head:

In the 1967 Grey Cup, Hamilton defeated Saskatchewan 24-1 in Ottawa. The Roughriders’ lone point came on an 87-yard punt on a quick kick by Alan Ford.

In 1972,  Ian Sunter kicked a 34-yard field goal as time ran out, giving Hamilton a 13-10 home-field win over Saskatchewan.

In 1989, Saskatchewan returned the favour as Dave Ridgway’s field goal was the difference in a 43-40 win over Hamilton, capping a thrilling game.

Three heartbreakers:

In 1962, kicker Don Sutherin missed two converts and a 30-yard field goal in the Fog Bowl as Hamilton lost 28-27 to Winnipeg. It was the Ticats’ fourth Grey Cup loss in five years to the Blue Bombers.

In 1976, Ottawa’s Tony Gabriel caught a 24-yard touchdown pass with 20 seconds left for a 23-20 win over Saskatchewan.

In 2009, Montreal’s Damon Duval missed a last-second field-goal attempt that appeared to give Saskatchewan the win, but a too-many-men penalty led to a re-kick and Duval made it this time, giving Montreal a 28-27 win. (Source: Postmedia News)

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Tuesday, November 19, 2013By Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Hamilton Tiger-Cats finally earn trip to Grey Cup after years in CFL wilderness

For SaleThe big men sat like happy boulders in their stalls, cutting off tape and laughing as the sweat dried, giants who couldn’t feel the pain. Left guard Peter Dyakowski said, “I hate those guys who have three Grey Cup rings,” and right guard Tim O’Neill said, “there’s always somebody on every team you’re rooting for,” and Dyakowski said with a grin, “aside from the East final year in Winnipeg [in 2011], we were always out of it early enough that the bitterness would have faded away.” They talked about how there are guys in this league who have three rings, five rings, even more, and Hamilton Tiger-Cats centre Marwan Hage, the fulcrum of this franchise for a decade, grinned sweetly.

“And I hate on every one of them,” he said.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats are headed to the Grey Cup for the first time since 1999, back when Ronnie Lancaster was still alive, a lifetime in an eight-team league, an ocean. They did it by crushing the defending Grey Cup champion Toronto Argonauts and their near-perfect quarterback in a half for the ages, a half they had been waiting for forever. Hage arrived in 2004, the same year Bob Young rescued the team from a fiscal sinkhole, and lived through the bad years. 4-14, 5-13, 3-15, 3-15 again. A joke, year after year. When they got talent, they found ways to screw it up. Hage was an all-star. He could have left.

“I used to drive to Montreal after each season, within two or three days, and you reflect,” said Hage, after Hamilton’s 36-24 victory over Toronto at the Rogers Centre. “Five hours on the road, and I’d think, ‘Man, am I doing the right thing here?’ Because I’d see my friends leave and go to other teams and win. And win. I can name so many guys who went to six different teams and four championships and …

“But to me, I wouldn’t trade it. I love the city of Hamilton. Hamilton’s been great to me, from Day 1, even in the bad times.”

There will be people who will half-jokingly blame this victory on Toronto mayor and global punchline Rob Ford, who arrived at halftime in his No. 12 MAYOR FORD Argos jersey. He sat in the lower bowl and posed for pictures, signed autographs, and brandished a tinfoil Grey Cup over his head, which probably interfered with police radio frequencies. One woman wearing black and gold held up a sign that said “Our mayor is better than your mayor;” one pro-Argos sign in the upper deck read “We have more than enough Tiger-Cats to eat at home.” The mayor caused a scene, as he tends to do these days. (Source: National Post)