It was like night and day.

With a week’s worth of adjustments, the Stampeders defensive line was rock solid in the Red & White’s 43-28 victory over the Hamilton Tiger-Cats Saturday in the Steel City.

The performance was a far cry from their prior tilt in Edmonton, when the club gave up six touchdowns in the Stamps’ 48-42 loss to the Eskimos on Sept. 8.

According to defensive lineman Derek Wiggan, when the squad headed east, they were determined to prove their capabilities.

“Edmonton was very uncharacteristic of us,” said Wiggan. “We don’t give up that many points, so we wanted to come out and have a better showing. We wanted to head into this bye on a strong note, and get ready for the home stretch.

“In Hamilton, we just executed. We knew they had a couple of things they like to do to try and neutralize us, and we knew it was going to be on us if we wanted to get the result.”

And what a result it was, as the line only gave up nine points over the weekend, recorded four sacks, and completely shut down Hamilton quarterback Jeremiah Masoli.

“We know Masoli is a great improviser, he’s great at making something out of nothing,” Wiggan explained. “We knew if we kept him contained we’d give ourselves a better chance to win, so that was just the game plan.

“We focused on making sure we rushed together, rushed as a unit, and made sure everyone was on the same page, so we were able to keep him in the pocket.”

The D-Line also kept the Ti-Cats’ running game in check, as Hamilton only managed 71 yards on 15 rush attempts.

“Coach (Corey) Mace does a great job at giving us the keys to victory,” Wiggan said. “We knew we had to control the line of scrimmage, basically in every football game that’s what you want to control.

“We just wanted to do what we usually do, stop the run, stop the passer, and those were the keys to our success.”

Next up after their bye week, the Stampeders take on the 3-8 Toronto Argonauts at McMahon Stadium on Sept. 28.

Toronto will be a desperate bunch, battling for their playoff lives.

“They’re going to give us everything they got,” said Wiggan. “We beat them on their field, they’re going to try to beat us at ours…everyone’s fighting for their playoff lives, during this part of the season you’re going to get everyone’s best.”