“The boy is fast. Did I mention he’s fast? And he’s fast. He’s fast, too.” Yes, Bryan Hall, we get it, Brandon Banks can run. He ran all over the Montreal Alouettes on Sunday with three punt return touchdowns in the East Final (though one was called back). Yes, Bryan, he isn’t half bad at running with the football.
The CFL world was in shock last week as Banks did indeed run in two TDs at home against a very weak special teams coverage in Montreal, along with another one negated when one of his teammates was holding the kicker Sean Whyte. If the kicker, the weakest tackler on the field, didn’t have to be held, Banks would have had a hat-trick of punt return majors and would have put up 18 points for his club. Instead, the speedy receiver put up only 12. Ask Banks and he’d say he would have liked to have put up all the points for his team.
Heading into the Grey Cup, Brandon Banks might be the most talked about player out of both sides – and that includes last year’s MOP Jon Cornish on the other side for the Calgary Stampeders. The Stampeders have the hottest offence in the league this season, even without Jon Cornish, who missed a significant amount of time. Yet Banks is under the brightest spotlight in Vancouver.
On Sunday, under a dome and with no wind, Brandon Banks will look to change the game in his team’s favour by doing exactly what he did one week prior: run, run, run. Of course, not only does he have to run as fast as he can but also elude tackles. He certainly made that task look easy against Montreal. Standing at 5’7″ and weighing about 140 pounds, the returner is smaller than many high school football players. But he uses his small size to his advantage when the big boys can’t keep up with him or grab onto any part of his tiny body to bring him down.
The Calgary Stampeders were one of the few teams to contain Banks this year on the punt return, holding him to an average of just 7.3 yards on four returns in the latter of their two games. Only four other times – twice against Ottawa, and once each against Edmonton and Toronto – did Banks have a smaller average than in that second game against Calgary. In their first meeting, Banks averaged 14 yards, which still isn’t terrible for the Calgary special teams compared to the 45-yard-average he dashed for against Montreal.
Brandon Banks scored two return touchdowns this season, one off a kickoff and the other off a punt – of course, this doesn’t include his runs last Sunday. The punt return came right at the site of the Grey Cup, B.C. Place. In week 7, Banks took the ball 97 yards down the indoor turf right into pay dirt for one of the more exciting plays of the CFL season. Already comfortable with the playing turf and with no exterior environmental effects on him, Banks will no doubt want to duplicate that punt return.
In a game where the Stampeders are heavy favourites, where Bo-Levi Mitchell, Nik Lewis, Marquay McDaniel and Jon Cornish can score on almost any drive, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats will almost need to rely on Brandon Banks to have a big game. Zach Collaros, Luke Tasker, Andy Fantuz, and Nic Grisby can certainly play with their counterparts, but haven’t had the same impact this year. If Banks can make that key return, he may be able to spark the underachieving Ti-Cats offence into a possible Grey Cup victory.
Sit back and relax, Tiger-Cats fans. You have the fastest man in the league on your side (sorry Chad Owens). If the Calgary Stampeders can’t contain Brandon Banks, the Grey Cup might just be heading East.
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