Tiger-Cats fans send team off to Grey Cup 0:51
Tiger-Cats fans send team off to Grey Cup 0:51
No one knows what the Hamilton Tiger-Cats are going through as they gear up for the 102nd Grey Cup like the Ticats that came before them.
CBC Hamilton spoke with three Hamilton Tiger-Cats who played in the big game though the years to get their insights into what it's like to play on Canadian football's biggest stage. They are:
Hall-of-fame linebacker Bob Krouse, who won four Grey Cups as a Tiger-Cat in 1963, 1965, 1967 ad 1972.
Former Ticats quarterback Dave Marler, who lost in the final in 1980.
Kicker Paul Osbaldiston, who played in four Grey Cups including the Ticats' last win in 1999 (also in Vancouver, also against the Calgary Stampeders.)
Here are their Grey Cup memories, starting in the locker room before the game.
Dave Marler (DM): "The old saying is 'you have to treat the Grey Cup like any other game.' And that is so true. But the reality is it's not like any other game."
Paul Osbaldiston (PO): "You go through a period before the coach and sometimes your team leaders makes their speech where it's eerily quiet. Everyone is kind of taking on the weight of it all."
Bob Krouse (BK): "I was not one of the rah-rah people. I'd be in the back. I meditated. I was thinking about my game plan.
"In '72 I was ready. I said 'let's get out there and do it!' That's how I felt. I was waiting. I wanted the game. All the week before, all the blah-blah before the game, it just drives you crazy."
PO: "I always tried to take emotion out of it. The worst thing I could do was get all fired up and you know, let the magnitude of the situation change my thought process. Easier said than done.
"I'd go out the tunnel with everybody, but at the same time as the coaches would go to the sideline, I'd just walk with them. The jumping around, the yelling and screaming, that was counterproductive for me."
BK: "The first punt down there that's where I got a ding in the head. We were watching the Grey Cup recently, I'm staning beside Ben Zambiasi (another Ticat great) and he right away saw.
'Oh, you got dung, eh?'
'Yeah, haha.'
'They didn't take you out?'
'No, I was calling the defences. I had to stay in.'
"You ring and so you take a deep breath and you try and shake it and get it off. Now I'm glad they take people out. As a high school coach I made sure I watched kids … I'd take their helmets away as soon as I saw a ding."
DM: "It is such a big game on such a big stage. We were a team, quite honestly, that wasn't prepared well enough to play that game. And I'm speaking strictly from a player point-of-view.
"We were trying to beat one of the best teams of all time in the Edmonton Eskimos, and it would have taken the greatest game that we potentially ever play. And we weren't prepared."
PO: "Somehow — I don't know why — I always seem to over-perform at Grey Cups. It's a great problem to have, and I wish I could can it and sell it. For whatever reason I always seem to punt better, kick better. My numbers in Grey Cups are way above my career averages. It brings a heightened awareness. A heightened level of concentration.
CBC Hamilton: What was it like to kick a field goal in the big game?
'I wanted the game. All the week before, all the blah-blah before the game, it just drives you crazy,' said former Ticat Bob Krouse, of the lead-up to the Grey Cup. (John Rieti/CBC)
PO: "Obviously very good. But the thing with kicking is, kicking and punting is a very humbling occupation. You can go from being on top of the world to the bottom of the world in a very quick moment. For me, until the game was over there was no celebrating or enjoying thing.
"The Canadian game is very different. You can be way ahead and not be ahead enough."
CBC Hamilton: Dave, at what point was your team really in trouble?
DM: "We were fighting tooth and nail to try to stay close to Edmonton and they ran a fake punt with Neil Lumsden that ran for a touchdown that kind of broke our back. From that point forward, we weren't really in the game at all.
"Nervous isn't the proper description of what goes on in the huddle. It's just, I would say it's a lack of focus from everybody in the huddle to do their particular job.
"We had breakdowns. We couldn't change that momentum they'd built up."
CBC Hamilton: Bob, what's halftime like for a player?
BK: "Too long. Too long in the Grey Cup. You can lose focus. You can cool down. You get out there and you have to really warm up again, especially like in '67 when we came out and played on an ice field -- we were wearing broomball shoes. That makes a difference, you know. That could be a turning point."
On glory, and defeat
As the final quarters rage on, some games are close while others, like Marler's loss in 1980 and Osbaliston's win in 1999, wind their way toward conclusion.
DM: "We were somewhat overwhelmed by their physical ability. We couldn't seem to slow them down. So, you know, doing the 'rah-rah' speech in the huddle and all that in the huddle, it was tough."
PO: "'99 was a special year for the team. In '98 we'd gone and lost on the last play of the game. When we showed up at training camp, everyone had unspoken sense or feeling that we're just gonna get to the Grey Cup and win it.
"There wasn't a particular play that turned momentum. From opening kickoff we controlled every aspect of the game."
"In the 1972 Grey Cup, it came right down to the wire.
BK: "I was on the sideline. 'Stump,' they called him — Ian Sunter — kicked a 30-some yard field goal. He was only 19, 20-years-old at the time.
"I had an outstanding game. I blocked a punt early, touched another one, recovered one, called the defence, made tackles… I put my head down. I didn't want to see it. I wanted to hear it. I wanted to hear the crowd go crazy.
"I said 'he's gotta make it, he's gotta make it.' The kid's gotta kick the field goal, you know? He's gotta kick it.
"You get a great feeling after. You know you've won. You're excited. But you know what, in retrospect it was the only Grey Cup that I felt sorry for the other team. I thought it was a really hard fought game. There was a little bit of empathy for their loss. But I was still elated about our win."
'Don't take it lightly'
A framed picture in Krouse's home shows him alongside his former teammate, and favourite player, Garney Henley. (John Rieti/CBC)
PO: "A lot of guys on the team hadn't won a Grey Cup before. They get the trophy and the stage out and everything and I didn't want to go up there for some reason.
"I just stood off to the side on the field and watched all the guys and the smiles on their faces. For some reason it was just the right thing to do.
(Coach) Ron Lancaster was standing about five or six feet away from me and he was looking at me and laughing.
'What are you laughing at?'
'You're doing the same thing I am. I know why you're not up there.'
"That stood out to me."
DM: "It was very quiet. Very subdued … just a major disappointment.
"The reality is it's so rare to get to a Grey Cup. I never got back to another one. Anybody I've talked to over the years, I'm saying 'don't take it lightly.' You gotta focus for one week on the task at hand and forget about everything else.
"The teams that play well and are successful, tip your hat to them because it's really not an easy week."
BK: "You're elated. You're high – and I'm not talking about from drugs. You're high. It takes a long time to get to sleep. There were times that I felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to my body … and then, you can't sleep."
PO: "To me, one of the greatest places in the world to be is in the locker room with your teammates after a win. I never wanted to leave. That's the best feeling in the world."
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