Elks 33, B.C. Lions 16: Life without Vernon Adams looks bleak

The B.C. Lions wondered what life without Vernon Adams Jr. would look like.

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Turns out, it’s the same as life has been with Adams recently.

With Jake Dolegala under centre for their injured presumptive MOP candidate, the offensively meagre Lions lost their third straight game Sunday night at Commonwealth Stadium, falling 33-16 to the Edmonton Elks.

Since dominating the Saskatchewan Roughriders in their first-place showdown back in the middle of July, the Leos have face-planted against three straight sub-.500 teams.

Calgary had two wins before getting No. 3 over B.C. on July 21, the first defeat in the skid. The two-win Winnipeg Blue Bombers embarrassed the Lions in a shutout blowout the next week, bringing us to Sunday night at Commonwealth, where the Elks hadn’t won since September of last year.

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Behind their own backup quarterback, Edmonton beat the Lions to pull themselves back into the West Division picture with their — hold on, checking the notes — second win of the year.

The Lions were at 5-1 before this slide and looking every bit like Grey Cup contenders. Now they’ve got to start looking over their shoulders at both Calgary (4-5) and Winnipeg (3-6), and up at the Saskatchewan Roughriders (5-3-1). They have scored three touchdowns in their last three games.

Adams had been incandescent before running into the Stamps, on pace for a 6,000 yard season. But he had just 192 yards and two picks in Calgary, and had no answers for the Bombers, putting up just 74 yards before leaving with a knee injury late in Winnipeg.

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Now he’s week-to-week, with no firm timeline for his return.

But don’t point fingers at Dolegala for this L. In his first start of the year, he was 14-of-23 for 146 yards, no touchdowns and no interceptions. The numbers were predictable because A) he’d had one week of practice with the starters, and B) B.C. came in with a Will Stanback-focused game plan which was effective through three quarters. Stanback had 87 yards on 13 carries, both season highs.

Dolegala made some bad throws, he made some great ones, and wasn’t helped out by Alex Hollins and Stanley Berryhill both dropping perfectly thrown balls on second down, stalling out momentum.

B.C. Lions’ quarterback Jake Dolegala (9) makes a pass against the Edmonton Elks at Commonwealth Stadium on Sunday Photo by David Bloom /David Bloom/Postmedia

B.C. was 9-of-19 on second down, and once again leaned on kicker Sean Whyte and his record-setting foot, as he booted three field goals to extend his streak to 45 straight.

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“It was sloppy,” Dolegala said. “We didn’t execute the way we needed to. We’ve to stay on the field, we’ve got to help our defence out. They just can’t be out there all the time. We got to convert some of these second downs.

“And when we’re down there, we got to put the ball in the end zone — simple as that. Three points are great but, seven means a lot more than three.”

As for his own performance stepping in for the injured Adams, who is week to week with a knee injury, Dolegala snuffed that line of questioning with a terse “It’s not about me. The team lost.”

Quoth Hamlet: “Aye, there’s the rub.”

The first domino to go was safety Christophe Beaulieu, who left the game with an injury. Then it was linebacker Ben Hladik. Then Bo Lokombo. As the Elks rode their twin-headed hydra of running backs Jevon Leake (21 carries, 97 yards) and Justin Rankin (7/77), B.C. was scraping the barrel of its depth.

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The Edmonton Elks’ Javon Leake (22) runs the ball against the B.C. Lions during CFL action at Commonwealth Stadium, in Edmonton Sunday Aug. 11, 2024. Photo by David Bloom Photo by David Bloom /Postmedia

The Lions defence was getting gashed on the ground and diced up through the air. Tre Ford was 6-of-6 for 96 yards before B.C.’s Sione Teuhema knocked him from the game just before half, and backup McLeod Bethel-Thompson was 6-for-6 before getting picked off by Ciante Evans. He finished 14-of-18 for 171 yards and a touchdown.

Special teamer Juliano Falaniko got his named mentioned for the first time this season, with the rookie’s contacting the kicker penalty giving the Elks a fresh set of downs late in the fourth quarter. Edmonton scored on the drive, turning a one-score game into a 30-16 lead after a two-point conversion.

Coach Rick Campbell also had his moments, electing to go for it on a second quarter third-and-five from Edmonton’s 40, instead of lining Whyte up for a field goal. The long bomb from Dolegala sailed well over the head of a double-covered Keon Hatcher running the corner route.

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“As a whole football team. We’re just not making the plays necessary to win games,” said Campbell. “Yeah, it’s a long season. There’s a lot of important football coming up. We’ve hit a rough spot. I like our coaches, I like our players, but we’re not playing well enough as a team right now.

“We’re not doing those critical plays. I’ve seen us do it before, so I’m very hopeful that we’ll get back to it, but we just need to make sure we get our players have a full understanding of what they’re doing so they can play fast and make plays.”

The B.C. Lions’ Keon Hatcher Sr. (4) is tackled by the The Edmonton Elks’ Derrick Moncrief (29) during CFL action at Commonwealth Stadium, in Edmonton Sunday Aug. 11, 2024. Photo by David Bloom Photo by David Bloom /Postmedia

When the Lions faced the Blue Bombers in June, when Winnipeg was 0-2 on their way to an 0-4 start, they made sure to point out their West rivals were a good team that just wasn’t stringing the critical plays together.

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Now the Leos are that team struggling to win those intra-game micro-battles, and losing on a macro level as a result.

Their chance to stem the bleeding comes next Sunday when they host those same Bombers in a crucial tiebreaker game. The upper bowl is open for this one — presumably for fans to see Winnipeg native and Canadian treasure Fred Penner.

Then again, Penner’s magnum opus couldn’t be a more fitting potential outcome from the Lions perspective.

“The cat came back, they thought he was a goner … But the cat came back, it just couldn’t stay away …”

And no, people, we don’t mean Nathan Rourke. That cat will be in the NFL for the foreseeable future.

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