Alexander, Philpot shine as Alouettes hold on for win over Redblacks

Davis Alexander didn’t seem like a quarterback who’d just led his team to another victory — and a 3-1 record.

The Montreal Alouettes’ star pivot offered a brutally honest assessment of what had just transpired at Percival Molson Memorial Stadium on Sunday night.

“I’m gonna say it. It was awful,” a visibly frustrated Alexander said on the side of the field post-game. “Way too close of a game, awful for our standard.”

Despite big performances from Alexander and wideout Tyson Philpot, the Alouettes only barely held on to beat the struggling Ottawa Redblacks 37-35, a score line that looked unlikely when favoured Montreal cruised to a 21-6 halftime lead.

The Redblacks posted just 76 yards of net offence in the first half before responding with a pair of quick touchdowns to outscore the Alouettes 12-0 in the third quarter, continuing a woeful early-season trend for Montreal (3-1) after halftime.

“There’s something about that third quarter that we need to clean up,” Philpot said. “It pisses us off when we let teams back in, and we know when we play championship-winning football teams, we’re not going to find a way to win (playing) football like that.”

So, what’s the solution?

“I don’t know. I want to say laser focus through four quarters,” Alexander said. “But I don’t know, can you measure that? Is that actually the problem? That’s just the way I see it. I mean, I’m obviously pretty frustrated and pissed, but we just have to be better.”

Veteran defensive back Wesley Sutton offered a more philosophical explanation after another tough second half for the Alouettes’ defence.

“It’s not just football, it’s life. You get a promotion, you have success, and you just tend to fall back, but you have to continue to fight that,” said Sutton, who had one interception. “We have to fight that temptation to take our foot off the gas and relax.

“It’s just an innate feeling, you have success and you want to relax. You’ve got to fight, we have to be on each other to continue to keep pushing and finish.”

Head coach Jason Maas, meanwhile, wasn’t buying into the negative slant.

“Was it awful? I would never say that. I’m sorry, I don’t believe in that,” he said. “The CFL is hard to win games. Bottom line.

“Can you get upset about not playing to a standard on every play? Sure, you can do that. But a totality of a game and you win a game? You’ve got to be happy about that and proud of that.”

To Maas’ point, it wasn’t all bad.

Alexander completed 22-of-30 passes for 345 yards and two touchdowns for Montreal, improving his record as a CFL starter to 15-1 in the regular season.

His favourite target was Philpot, who hauled in 12 receptions for 198 yards — including 125 in the first half — before 17,138 fans.

In perhaps the play of the night, Alexander went deep up the middle to Snead on a 46-yard heave, helping the Alouettes take a nine-point lead with 56.4 left on a José Maltos Diaz field goal. The clutch play came moments after Alexander limped off a tackle, saying post-game he felt fine.

“It’s the way I’m built, the way I’m wired,” he said. “I’m in the Grey Cup, I’m playing on a torn hamstring, I throw a ball 65 yards to Snead. I mean, it doesn’t matter.”

The Redblacks immediately answered in stunning fashion as Kalil Pimpleton returned the ensuing kickoff 94 yards to make it 37-35 with 42 seconds remaining. But Philpot retrieved Ottawa’s onside kick to run out the clock and secure an Alouettes victory.

Ottawa, meanwhile, is still searching for its first win under head coach and general manager Ryan Dinwiddie (0-3), but had an encouraging second half.

Jake Maier was 27-of-38 passing for 336 yards with three touchdowns and one interception for Ottawa (0-3), while Keelan White caught two touchdowns as the offence and special teams found a rhythm against an Alouettes team that has surrendered 124 points through four games.

“I thought Jake battled, I thought the offence battled, where we kind of found an identity in the second (half) and we got to build off of that,” Dinwiddie said. “But no moral victories. We’re 0-3. That’s where we’re at.

“You can’t point fingers and blame. I told the guys, everybody’s got to have a lens and look in the mirror, including myself and the rest of the coaches.”

Redblacks: Host the Saskatchewan Roughriders on Friday.

Alouettes: Have a bye week, then host the Calgary Stampeders on Saturday, July 11.