The Ottawa Renegades are off to the best record in the franchises' short three year history, The Rens improved their record to 3-0 on Friday night, with a thorough thrashing of the Grey Cup champion Edmonton Eskimos.
Kerry Joseph threw for a club record 426 yards, launching an aerial assault not seen in Ottawa in a long, long time. Of the Renegades 44 points on the night Joseph was responsible for 36 of them, throwing for 3 touchdowns and running three in himself. In one word on the night Joseph was dominating. The Renegade quarterback by far the largest factor in the Rens 44-15 defeat of the Eskies.
A turn over in the second quarter turned the tide in the Friday Night football match up, as Mike Pringle was stripped of the ball on the Renegades one yard line, with the ball stripped by Tony White it was recovered by Gerald Vaughn. With the offensive set of downs deep in the Ottawa end, Joseph went to work starting with an 83 yard completion to Jason Armstead, three plays later Joseph tossed the a TD pass to Demetris Bendross putting the Rens up 16-12, from there the Rens never looked back. The Renegades merely recharged in the half time as they came out and Scored 28 more points in the second half, compared to the Eskimos 3.
For Edmonton the start to the defense of their Grey Cup has been nothing short of disastrous, 0-3 on the season this is the worst start for an Eskimo football team since the 1965 season. Defensively they have been victimized to the tune of 128 points; offensively things haven’t been much better managing to score only 58 points. The Eskimo offensive line has seemed incapable of keeping defenders out of the backfield, providing Jason Maas with little or no time to set up in the pocket.
Defensively the score speaks for itself; the Renegades continued to pick apart the Eskimo secondary exploiting some glaring weaknesses on the Defensive side of the ball. Eskimo defensive co-coordinator Greg Marshall has a bad weekend of film viewing ahead of him. The Nightmare on Bank Street guaranteed to be his horror pick of the month.
The Renegades who remain undefeated are finding the upper reaches of the East Division to their liking. A showdown with division rival Montreal is next on the agenda as the two Eastern titans meet on next Friday night. A guaranteed ratings winner for the folks at TSN and their Friday Night Football extravaganza, things are a lot easier to promote when the game itself provides its own drama. Montreal who play the Argos on Saturday, now have to look ahead to Friday night as well. Suddenly the Als stranglehold on the East is no longer quite so strong, with all four Eastern teams looking refreshingly strong this year, every night is going to be an important night in the CFL East.
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