The Ottawa Redblacks faced off against the Toronto Argonauts this afternoon at TD Place. The Redblacks’ family day game only got 22,489 fans, and the non-sellout may be a reason for the flat offensive performance.
With Jennings making his first start since the birth of his first child, the Redblacks were the favorites to win today’s game, and the favorites showed promise early on in the game.
Getting his first career interception, George Uko brought all of the momentum towards the Ottawa bench. Once on offense, Jennings went 2 for 2 for 22 yards towards Mossis Madu before throwing a 12 yard touchdown to Brad Sinopoli! The so called “not-used Sinopoli” caught his 3rd touchdown of the season tying Dominique Rhymes to lead the team.
After the game, I got a chance to talk to Uko about that interception, how it feels to get those two turnovers and what went through his head following his first interception.
Uko: “At first I was like ‘Damn I caught it!’ then I realized I had to run with it, and got tired a little bit. As a d-lineman , I don’t get to do it often, so I had fun doing it!”
Looking back at the rest of the game, that was really the only touchdown from the Ottawa offense. The defense stopped the Argos a good number of times, but the offense wasn’t having an easy time taking those turnovers and turning them into touchdowns.
The Redblacks’ went on to lose 46-17, while Lewis Ward stole the show, again. Ward was 3/4 from field goals, getting one rouge and one extra point conversion, which gives him 11 points on the day.
Bright spots of the loss
Sure, Lewis Ward is the one with most of the points at the end of the day, but we have an offense and defense too!
Although they gave up 46 points, the Redblacks’ defense started the day lights out! De’Chavon (Gump) Hayes was one of the additions to the team mid-way through this season, and today proved why we have him. Not just the tip-drill interception that he almost took to the house for a pick-6, but he had a few solid pass deflections to go with his 4 tackles on the day!
Along with Gump Hayes’ success on the day, the offense’s stars would be Jonathon Jennings, Mossis Madu and Dominique Rhymes.
Jennings made his third start of the season following a 200 yard performance just two weeks ago, and gave the Redblacks a reason why they signed him in the offseason. Jennings may have had a few questionable throws here and there, but he did end the day with 327 passing yards, 1 passing touchdown and 14 rush yards. If Jennings were to play like this every week for the remainder of the season, we may have a chance at the playoffs!
Along with the run game, running back Mossis Madu showed us that he is a pass catcher too! Madu got in rhythm early after catching 2 balls on the opening drive and went on to catch 12 of 14 targets for 80 yards while running the ball 6 times for 21 yards. With John Crockett placed on the 6-game injured list, we’ll have some fun watching Madu for which can be the rest of the season!
JZ MEDIA 