Toronto Argonauts collapse against Redblacks exposes team's flaws

TORONTO — The Toronto Argonauts appeared to be in full control against the Ottawa Redblacks Saturday afternoon at BMO Field until they weren't.

In what looked like it was going to be a dominant showing and a much-needed victory at home after building a 22-1 lead turned into a disaster.

By the final whistle, it was the Redblacks celebrating a 46-42 victory, leaving the defending Grey Cup champions once again shaking their heads after a mistake-filled performance and now sit with a 2-7 record.

Head coach Ryan Dinwiddie didn’t mince words about another unacceptable performance from his team.

"I sound like a broken record talking to them after the game," Dinwiddie said. "I just told them I'm not going to quit on them, and I don't think those guys quit on us, but I think we have some pretenders in the building who like to talk a big game and don't show up on game day.

"If you don't love it, let me know. I know I love it and I'm not going to quit."

It's easy to understand the frustration from Dinwiddie who once again saw his special teams and defence waste a strong performance from the offence.

“You’re up 22-1 — you should win that game,” Dinwiddie said. “We had every opportunity to put them away early. Anytime we scored on offence, we gave it right back. We’re not playing winning football.”

It was certainly a disappointing result for quarterback Nick Arbuckle who certainly did enough on paper to put his team in a position to win the game, throwing for 317 yards, three touchdowns and an interception on an attempt to try and push the ball on the Argos’ final offensive possession with 35 seconds left.

Despite the offence showing it can perform at a high level, Arbuckle knows there are still areas to correct.

“I'm not going to ever go out there and stand up in front of the defence or special teams, try to say anything, because I'm not in their film, I'm not in their calls. I don't know what their responsibilities are, who's doing what,” Arbuckle explained. But offensively, we're going to handle what we can. And we got to correct the mistakes that we had this game. We can't let the scoreboard, make us feel comfortable in what we accomplished.

“We had three two-and-outs in a row there in the second quarter, and that can't happen. And then, we didn't score on our last drive. There's a lot of room to get better, even with the performance that we had and if we were one drive better. It could have been a different ending.”

The team ranks last in the league in points per game allowed (32.4), last in rushing yards allowed (114.8), and sixth in total yards allowed on defence per game (366 yards).

Dinwiddie said these sudden swings from giving up points when getting a touchdown or field goal have been a recurring problem for the Argos and something the team has been attempting to rectify.

“We look at the analytics — anytime we score on offence, we give it right back,” he said. “We give up an 80-yard drive or a special teams play. We’re close in a lot of areas, but not playing complete football.”

On special teams, the team is just giving up too many yards on kick/punt returns and it puts the defence in a tough spot because it shortens the field for the opposing offence.

Missed tackles, players not staying in lanes and injuries have been major factors in the unit's struggles.

“We’ve got starters on special teams now trying to make it a priority, but as you can see, another week where it let us down,” Dinwiddie said. “We’re not tackling very well. There’s some accountability that needs to be there.”

You can tell that now the coach's priority is to keep the players' mindsets on the next game and avoid any desire to throw in the towel on the season.

“I told them I’m not going to quit on them, and I don’t think they’ve quit on us,” he said.

The Argonauts won’t have long to dwell on the loss as they visit Edmonton next week in a battle of struggling clubs.

Does this group have the belief that they can pull themselves out of the hole they've dug themselves in?

“I feel like we have everything we need right here in this locker room to turn it around, to get it done, to go win games and do everything we want to do,” defensive lineman Jordan Williams said after the game. “We got everything we need in this locker room. We’re not going to point any fingers blame anybody but we’re going to keep showing up. We just need to keep our spirits high, no matter what.”