Last Saturday at BMO Field in Toronto, the reigning Grey Cup Champs Toronto Argonauts defeated the Edmonton Eskimos 20-17. This Friday night, the Eskimos will look to square up their season series against the Argos in the rematch.
The action will take place at Edmonton’s Commonwealth Stadium on Friday, July 13th at 7:00 PM on TSN.
Keys To An Eskimos Victory
Through four weeks of the young CFL season, the Eskimos find themselves with a 2-2 record. This record is an absolute reflection of the inconsistency that this team has seen through the first few weeks. Of course, the Eskimos want to get back into the win column, and this is how they will do it.
Show Up On Time
It is imperative that the Eskimos have a much better start than they have had in their last two outings.
Two weeks ago against BC, it took a full quarter-and-a-half before the Eskimos found their rhythm in all aspects of the game. And then last week before the game was even six minutes old, the Eskimos found themselves down by two touchdowns. They were able to escape with a victory against the Lions but were not so fortunate against the Argos.
This team simply must show up ready to play at the opening kickoff this Friday, or it could be another long night.
Eliminate Unnecessary Penalties
After four games, the Eskimos have the second-most penalties in the CFL with 37. Only the Montreal Alouettes have more with 46.
The Eskimos had their highest number of infractions in a single game last week taking 12 penalties. The bulk of penalties occurred on offence where they had seven in total. One of which included a holding call that negated a touchdown run by CJ Gable. Consequently, the Eskimos would turn the ball over just two plays later to waste a good drive.
If the Eskimos are going to find success in their rematch on Friday night and the rest of the year, they will need to eliminate the unnecessary penalties from their game.
Find Success On The Ground
This season, Eskimos star running back CJ Gable has been unable to find a level of consistent success that he has had in years past. Except for one game against the BC Lions, Gable has had a very underwhelming season up to this point.
In Week 3 against the Lions, Gable ran for an impressive 165 yards and a touchdown on 23 carries. In the other three games combined, he has had 32 carries for just 115 yards and 0 touchdowns. With an average of only 3.6 yards per carry over those three games – this is simply not good enough.
If Gable can get back to his 2017 form where he had an average yards per carry of 5.7, the Eskimos will have a much better chance of sustaining drives that result in scores.
Prediction
Last week I predicted the Eskimos to defeat the Argos handily, and I couldn’t have been more wrong. That said, I’m dusting myself off and getting back on that same horse.
If the Eskimos can execute on all of the above, I believe that they should be able to pull off a lopsided victory. So let’s try this again; Eskimos win their rematch with the Argos.
33-17 Eskimos.
Enjoy the game.
Main image credit:
Embed from Getty Images
