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November 12, 2015

A comeback victory

By Stampeders.com Staff

For a team that finished the regular season with a robust 11-7 record, the 1991 Calgary Stampeders were hardly in a secure and comfortable frame of mind as they entered the post-season.

For starters, the Stamps’ opponent in the West semifinal — the BC Lions — had turned in an identical 11-7 mark. Led by quarterback and future Stamp Doug Flutie — who would win the first of his six career Most Outstanding Player awards that season — the Lions boasted a formidable offence that had produced 661 points, an average of 36.7 per game, during the regular season.

What’s more, the beleaguered Stamps had been shut out in the 1980s when it comes to playoff victories, with their most recent post-season win having come 12 years earlier in 1979. And, to top it all off, the reward for a positive result in the semifinal was a West final date with the powerful first-place Edmonton Eskimos, who had knocked the Red and White out of the playoffs three of the previous five seasons and five times in a row dating back to 1978.

Oh, and did we mention that the Stamps found themselves down 31-15 at halftime of that 1991 semifinal against the Lions?

It would have been a tough sell at that precise time, but history has shown that there was something special about that 1991 Calgary club in relation to the teams that had broken Stamps fans’ hearts the previous two decades. Under head coach Wally Buono (and offensive coordinator John Hufnagel), the 1991 Stamps possessed a hearty quality that simply would not allow members of the team to accept that a game was over despite a 16-point deficit against a dangerous opponent that had seemingly taken a firm hold on momentum by scoring 14 points in the final three minutes and five seconds of the opening half.

Led by quarterback Danny Barrett, the Stamps chalked up 28 points in the third quarter alone to obliterate the halftime deficit.

Calgary wasted no time in getting the comeback under way as the Stamps received the opening kickoff, gained 29 yards on a pass from Barrett to Peewee Smith and, after a couple of BC penalties, found the end zone when Barrett connected with Dave Sapunjis.

Smith and Allen Pitts also had touchdown catches during the Stamps’ third-quarter uprising while Keyvan Jenkins fell on a loose ball in the end zone to account for Calgary’s other major.

Just like that, a 31-15 deficit had become a 43-34 Calgary lead.

The Lions made things interesting midway through the fourth quarter when Flutie scored on a one-yard run to make it 43-41 but the Stamps defence, led by the likes of Alondra Johnson, Junior Thurman, Dan Wicklum and Kent Warnock, held firm the rest of the way to preserve the two-point victory and a trip to Edmonton the following week.

Barrett finished the contest with a whopping 420 passing yards and a franchise-playoff-record five touchdowns, with Pitts — six catches for 173 yards and two scores — being his favourite target.

Flutie, meanwhile, was just 17 of 32 for 257 yards with no touchdown passes and one interception.

Having finally earned a post-season victory, the Stamps marched up to Edmonton and exorcised more demons by posting yet another dramatic victory — Calgary trailed 33-18 after three quarters — and finally beating the Eskimos.

The end of the line came a week later in the Grey Cup as the Stamps fell to the Toronto Argonauts, but Calgary’s playoff performance in 1991 set the stage for the following year when the Stamps won their first Grey Cup in 21 years.