3 strengths for every team in the Division Semi-Finals
By Don Landry
In football, they say it’s a good idea to play to your strengths.
That’s always apparent, but never more so than at playoff time.
Ahead of this Saturday’s Eastern and Western Semi-Finals, here are three strengths for each of the combatants as they hope to push onward towards a berth in the Division Finals.
MONTREAL ALOUETTES
1. BACK TO THE TOP OF THE HEAP
Defence, defence, defence.
The Alouettes gave up the throne as the CFL’s top-ranked defence back in Week 10, with the Saskatchewan Roughriders taking over and riding a green wave for the rest of the season.
Until last week.
In the final regular season rankings, the Als once more sit at the top with 34 ranking points, three better than second-place Saskatchewan.
Montreal’s pass defence was the league’s best, allowing 256.9 yards a game.
2. A REVITALIZED OFFENCE
Don’t judge the Alouettes offence by its rather flat performance in a Week 21 loss in Winnipeg. Their starting quarterback, Davis Alexander, didn’t play at all and he makes a huge, huge difference to the unit.
When Alexander returned to action at the end of September, after two months off due to a hamstring injury, the Montreal offence was immediately resuscitated, as the 27-year-old pivot threw for a total of 918 yards and four touchdowns in three starts, all Montreal victories.
While Winnipeg beat the Als twice during the regular season, they didn’t face Alexander either time.
3. THEY GET AFTER YA
Under defensive coordinator Noel Thorpe’s eye, the Montreal pass rush is a fearsome thing to try and keep at bay, whether that rush comes off a variety of different blitz packages or as a straight-ahead, three or four-man attack.
With 45 sacks, led by defensive end Isaac Adeyemi-Berglund’s 11, the Alouettes finished tied for first in that category, with 13 different players chipping in to add to the total, including linebacker Tyrice Beverette, who had seven.
WINNIPEG BLUE BOMBERS
1. THEY MATCH UP WELL ON THE GROUND
The Blue Bombers finished the regular season as the number-two ranked rushing team in the CFL, with an average of 124.1 yards per game and 5.5 yards per rush, led by the team’s Most Outstanding Player, running back Brady Oliveira (1,163 yards, a 5.4 yard average).
While the Alouettes ended the season with the number one ranked defence, in which category did they wind up with merely a middling ranking?
That’s right. Run defence. The Alouettes were sixth in the category, allowing an average of 103.1 yards per game and their 5.4 average against ranked them seventh.
Oliveira’s best rushing game of the season (137 yards and a touchdown) came in Montreal back in Week 12.
2. GET THAT GARBAGE OUTTA HERE
The Winnipeg pass defence hasn’t pulled down a lot of interceptions in 2025, ranking tied for last in the category with just 13 but it does not mean they were not getting their paws up to snuff out potential completions.
The Bombers’ air defence led the CFL with 73 knockdowns, and believe it or not, not all of those swats were made by defensive end Willie Jefferson at the line of scrimmage, even though it sometimes seemed that way, what with Big Willie leading the league with 16.
Jefferson’t teammate, defensive back Deatrick Nichols, was second, with 13.
Overall, Winnipeg’s pass defence finished second to Montreal’s, yielding an average of 261.4 yards per game.
3. LIGHTNING IN A BOTTLE
Rookie returner Trey Vaval finished third in the CFL in combined yards with 2,266 but unlike the two men who finished just ahead of him — Edmonton’s Javon Leake and Ottawa’s Khalil Pimpleton — all of Vaval’s yards came on returns.
Four of the 25-year-old’s returns — one on a punt, two on kickoffs and a 128-yarder on a missed field goal — were returned for touchdowns.
Vaval led the CFL in both punt return yardage (957) and missed field goal return yardage (391).
BC LIONS
1. OFFENCE, OFFENCE, OFFENCE
Led by a 5,000-yard quarterback in Nathan Rourke, a 1,600-yard receiver in Keon Hatcher Sr. and a 1,200-yard receiver in Justin McInnis, the Lions already have an embarrassment of riches on offence.
Then you add a 1,200-yard running back in James Butler to the mix and you’ve got nitro-glycerine.
Hatcher led the CFL in receiving yards with 1,688 and he also led in Yards After Catch, with 611, with his average of 93.8 receiving yards per game also being tops.
The Lions led the CFL in ‘Big Plays’ in 2025, with 63, and 40 of those (30 or more passing yards) were delivered off the arm of Rourke.
Then there’s receiver Ayden Eberhardt, who might be less-targeted, but who makes the most of the situation. His 45 receptions amounted to a league-leading average of 19.2 yards per catch.
2. MR. AUTOMATIC
In his 16th season in the CFL, Sean Whyte keeps on keeping on.
The 40-year-old placekicker connected on 39 of 41 field goal attempts, including 29 of 29 from less than 40 yards out. If you factor in converts (49 of 52), Whyte’s overall percentage was 94.6 during the 2025 regular season.
The Lions don’t ask for bombs from Whyte (one attempt from outside 50), they just ask that long snapper Kyle Nelson, holder Carl Meyer and Whyte routinely run a clean operation from reasonable distances.
Which they mostly do.
3. THEY ALSO GET AFTER YA
Just like the Montreal Alouettes, the Lions’ have a fearsome pass rush, tying for the league lead with 45 sacks in 2025.
The difference is that Montreal’s impressive numbers began with the dawning of the regular season, while the Lions turned a slow start into a whirlwind second half of quarterback corralling.
Defensive end Mathieu Betts — the CFL’s Most Outstanding Defensive Player in 2023 — has been the parade leader, with 11 of his league-leading 15 sacks coming in his last six games.
16 different players have contributed to the Lions’ sack totals in 2025, but Betts is quite clearly the dominant one, having 10 more sacks than defensive lineman Jonah Tavai, who ranks second on the team.
CALGARY STAMPEDERS
1. THE GAME’S BEST GROUND ATTACK
The Stampeders ended the regular season with the CFL’s top rushing attack, with a team total of 2,280 yards working out to 126.7 yards per game.
The bulk of that, of course, was provided by the league’s leading rusher, running back Dedrick Mills (1,409 yards, a 5.6 yards per carry average), who also led the league with an eye-popping 46 carries of 10 or more yards.
Lately, Calgary has added rookie running back Ludovick Choquette more to the mix and he finished the season with a 5.9 yard average on 40 carries.
BC’s run defence gave up an average of 105.3 yards per game in 2025, ranking seventh.
2. THE FEELING HAS RETURNED
Calgary began the season as one of the darlings of the CFL, getting out to a 5-1 start and then hitting the post-Labour Day mark at 8-3.
A four-game losing streak took over at that point but the Stampeders have regained their footing, reeling together a three-game heater to end the regular season, and much more resembling the team that swept five games against division mates Saskatchewan and Winnipeg in the first half of the season.
3. DISRUPTIVE TENDENCIES. PROTECTIVE ONES AS WELL
Calgary’s defence, especially, has returned to the form that made them one of the most difficult crews to play against during the first half of the regular season.
While the Stamps finished fifth in sacks, the team total of 40 left them merely five behind the co-leaders in the category and their 39 tackles-for-loss ranked them number one in the CFL.
Calgary finished the season as the number two team in the Turnovers Forced category, with 42, just two back of the leaders, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
On the other side of the ledger, the Stampeders gave up the ball 33 times, ranking them third, with a second-best Turnover Ratio of plus-nine. The 58 points off turnovers they granted to opponents made them the stingiest of all CFL teams in that regard.
