Football: OUA's oh-fer in preseason is not a big deal ...

No one should make too much of results from games played after only a few days of training camp. Still, the OUA's results bear being listed in point form, n'est pas?
  • Sherbrooke 41, Ottawa 0
  • Concordia 40, Guelph 23
  • Saskatchewan 40, Western 12
  • McGill 40, U of T 17
  • Laval 76, York 0
Four of those five teams have a conference opener in just a few days. The charitable view is this is a season like no other, thanks to Waterloo putting everything in an uproar. It's bound to be a little messy in the early stages.

Three teams which were in the Top 10 last season, including Laurier and McMaster, did not have a tune-up game.

Of note, apparently U of T has cooked up an offensive package to take advantage of quarterback Andrew Gillis' unique passing and rushing skills.
"U of T didn’t feature its package against McGill, but there is a no-huddle dimension, known as lightning.

"When it's firing on all cylinders, Gillis looks like an athletic Boomer Esiason, throwing darts on the run and directing his offence.

" 'We want to be play fast,' [offensive lineman Josh] Gibbs added. 'Once we get the kinks out, I do believe we can be an explosive offence.' " (Toronto Sun)
Smart Football explained idea of "play fast" a couple years ago, trying to have ball snapped quickly and give the defence less time to prepare. Hey, it is the Varsity Blues. They have to try something.

U of T apparently had backup defenders in when McGill first-string QB Jonathan Collin did a lot of the Redmen's offensive damage in the second quarter.

Meantime, speaking of York, Lions rookie head coach Warren Craney told Le Soleil he actually had to cancel what he had planned for the first day of camp, Aug. 20, after half the players showed up late. That falls under the Changing The Culture heading.

A York-Laval one-liner, just say hey, York has lost by more (80-0 to Queen's in 2008) and Laval has won by more (94-0 over first-year Sherbrooke in '03). The Rouge et Or ended up averaging more yards per rush than the Lions averaged per completion, never mind per pass attempt. Laval's defence and special teams even managed to score two touchdowns.

Laval, not unlike the Oklahoma Sooners did in a 77-0 Big 12 blowout of Texas A&M back in '03, took pains not to run up the score. They didn't score in the fourth quarter and also kneeled out the clock at the end of the game after reaching the 5-yard line.

That game never should have been played, as someone pointed out in July.
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