B.C.’s best Grey Cup moments

In more than a century of Grey Cup history, B.C. has hosted Canada’s biggest annual party 15 times. The 16th will come this weekend when the Calgary Stampeders meet the Hamilton Tiger-Cats for the 102nd Grey Cup at B.C. Place.

Playing at home, the Lions have won twice. One of those championships, which came down to an unforgettable do-or-die field goal by kicker Lui Passaglia to keep the 1994 CFL title in Canada, tops this list of B.C.’s best Grey Cup moments. Read on to see what follows. Some Vancouverites will remember them all.

King Lui

A Canadian entity for 81 seasons, the CLF grew in a controversial cross-border expansion in 1994 and, for the first time, a U.S. club contended for the Grey Cup. “Free trade did not include the Grey Cup,” read one fan’s sign at the 81st Grey Cup. National pride and Canadian football identity were at stake Nov. 27 when 55,097 fans at B.C. Place clutched at the Maple Leaf as East Vancouver’s Lui Passaglia — the most accomplished kicker in all professional football — missed once before securing the trophy and the country’s honour. "The good Lord was looking after us," head coach Dave Ritchie told the Courier in 2010.

Baltimore led B.C. 17-10 at halftime and the Lions struggled as quarterback Kent Austin threw three interceptions. Ritchie called on Danny McManus, and the Lions took hold of the momentum late in the third quarter with a trick play; setting up for a field goal, holder Darren Flutie instead jumped up with the ball and scrambled to his right for a first-down at the 10-yard line. McManus then gambled and scored on a third down.

Tied at 23 in the fourth quarter, Passaglia set up to kick a game-winning field goal from the 37-yard line with 1:02 on the clock. He missed. The air went out of B.C. Place (which was hard to do with air-tight locks). B.C. recovered the ball, and Passaglia looked down redemption from 38 yards out. The club named that kick the greatest play in B.C. Lions history. B.C. won the Grey Cup 26-23.

The video gives me a chill every time I watch it.

The all-position all-star

On Nov. 25, 1955, the Grey Cup moved west of Toronto for the first time, and the CFL, which would not have this name for another three years but had expanded to include the Lions the previous season, witnessed one of its all-time greatest and most well-rounded athletes at his best. Jackie Parker, a Tennessee-born, record-setting player at Mississippi State, defied classification long before the era of multi-million dollar specialization and the fantasy draft.

As the Edmonton Eskimos quarterback in a 34-19 win over the Montreal Alouettes at Empire Stadium, Parker passed for 126 yards and threw for a touchdown in front of 39,417 fans, the largest crowd in the history of Canadian organized team sports and a Grey Cup attendance record that stood until 1976.

But that wasn’t all Parker did.

He rushed for 75 yards and made two interceptions on defence. He also had 13 tackles, a total that still puts him second overall in Grey Cup history. Today, he may have been an average quarterback, but when athletes still played both offense and defense, Parker was the best on the field.

He was selected a Western all-star eight times: three times as halfback and five times as quarterback. He was named the most-outstanding player in 1957, ’58 and ’60 and won three consecutive Grey Cup championships with Edmonton, the second at Empire Stadium in 1955.

Vancouver witnessed him at his peak, a pinnacle that lasted more than a decade and culminated in 16,470 passing yards, 750 points, 88 touchdowns and 40 field goals because — what more could you ask for? — he was a kicker, too. In 1962, he was traded to the Toronto Argonauts for five players and $15,000.

One of many career highlights came in the Grey Cup of 1954, as this video highlight shows.

The hit they still remember

The 51st Grey Cup is momentous for B.C. because it was the first time the Lions played for the championship at home. It was also their first Grey Cup, period. But the championship delivered two enormous, unforgettable blows: the agony of defeat in front of thousands of homers, and a late, high, out-of-bounds and unpenalized tackle on halfback Willie Fleming.

Largely because of the tackle on what was only Fleming’s fifth carry of the game, the Lions lost 21-10 to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. A player who averaged a CFL record 9.7 yards per carry that season, Fleming exited the 1963 Grey Cup having carried the ball for only 12 yards.

The Lions scored their first Grey Cup touchdown in the final two minutes of the fourth quarter when Joe Kapp connected with Mack Burton on a five-yard pass.

Kapp rekindled the fire at the 2011 Grey Cup festival in Vancouver when he and former Ti-Cat Angelo Mosca brawled on stage at a CFL Alumni Association luncheon. The Youtube videos of the men and their walking aids punching each other on stage has more than a million views. Mosca was the tackler who took out Fleming, ending his season and the Lions’ best chance to win their first Grey Cup at home. The next season, B.C. defeated Hamilton 34-24 to win the Grey Cup at Toronto’s CNE Stadium.

A quarterback kick

In this double-overtime thriller between hot-handed (and one suddenly kicking) quarterbacks, only the second Grey Cup determined by extra time since 1961, the Edmonton Eskimos knocked off the Montreal Alouettes 38-35 to win its 13th franchise title and second Cup three years, again over the Als.

In front of 58,157 on Nov. 27, 2005, Edmonton quarterback Ricky Ray was called off the bench in place of backup Jason Maas and rewarded head coach Danny Maciocia for the decision by completing a record 35 of 45 passes for 359 yards and two touchdowns.

The game’s high-scoring pace continued right through the final play when Montreal kicker Damon Duval forced overtime with a 27-yard field goal with no time remaining.

Both teams had a shot at the end zone, starting at their opponent’s 35. Montreal’s Anthony Calvillo connected on a 30-yard pass to Dave Stala. To tie and stave off defeat, Ray threaded the needle to find Jason Tucker 11 yards out. Tie game: 35-35.

Edmonton kicker Sean Fleming nailed a 36-yard field goal to lead by three to begin the second overtime, and Montreal crumbled under the pressure. Calvillo, his pass deflected, recovered and hit a wide, wide, wide-open receiver in the end zone — but the ball was dropped. The play was called as an illegal forward pass and the Als lost 10 yards. They lost another 11 when Calvillo was sacked, setting them up for a hail-Mary third-and-31. Calvillo resorted to punting the ball forward, desperate for Montreal to recover. They didn’t.

An internal CFL scoring system crashed. Edmonton won the Grey Cup.

Lions roar loudest

In 2011, the B.C. Lions pulled off a stunning turnaround to become the first team in CFL history to win the Grey Cup after starting the season with five straight losses. Finishing the regular season 11-7, B.C. launched an unimaginable championship run and hit the finish with a 34-23 win over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in front of 54,313 delirious fans at B.C. Place.

Quarterback Travis Lulay, who threw two second-half touchdowns and was named the game’s MVP, said he’d never wish the same journey on any team. "It's very easy to quit. It's very easy to turn on each other, to cannibalize, to save your own jobs and rat people out," he told the Courier in a post-game interview. "Nobody ever did that. We stuck together. We fought back one game at a time for the person beside us and today here we are, champions.”

And: Nickelback. Somebody is buying their stuff.