Tait: Bombers asking hard questions after losing 111th Grey Cup

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They are the hard questions being asked everywhere in Bomberland, including by those in the Winnipeg Blue Bombers locker room still sporting bleary eyes some two days after Sunday's loss in the 111th Grey Cup.

Teams always do deep dives after a season, whether it ends hoisting the trophy or — in the Blue Bombers case — watching the Toronto Argonauts celebrate right in front of them after the 41-24 loss in the championship game.

And the most pointed hard questions in the immediate aftermath are these:

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Why was Zach Collaros back in the game when the index finger on his throwing finger was so badly mauled it was clearly impacting his ability to throw the ball?

And, even as he did attempt to gut it out after the injury, why didn't the attack lean more heavily on Most Outstanding Player and two-time league rushing champion Brady Oliveira to pound the ball along the ground?

"I've been trying to reflect on the game, and it still doesn't make sense to me," said Oliveira, who finished the game with 11 carries for 84 yards — two of those carries coming on Winnipeg's last possession which began with 2:09 remaining and the team trailing 40-16. "The only thing I can really touch on is the fact that I thought the offensive line and myself could have had more opportunity to take the game over. I don't know why there wasn't more opportunity.

"I still need to reflect on that and maybe have some conversations with my teammates, maybe some of the coaches and really get to understand — I think I've earned the right to understand why it played out that way. It's just hard to reflect on it right now."

The Blue Bombers trailed 17-10 late in the third quarter when Collaros' hand hit an Argos pass rusher's helmet on a pass attempt to Keric Wheatfall. The club settled for a Sergio Castillo field goal on that drive to narrow the gap to 17-13. But with Collaros unavailable as the medical staff worked to fix his bad finger, Terry Wilson was behind centre following a Willie Jefferson interception early in the fourth that set up the attack on the Argos' 30-yard line.

Wilson then threw two passes, the second of which could have been intercepted, and the team settled for another field goal to narrow the Toronto lead to 17-16.

Collaros returned to the sideline and, after putting a glove on his throwing hand, was having difficulty getting any zip on his throws. He then returned to action and threw three interceptions in the final seven minutes, all part of a meltdown that saw the club go from trailing by a point to down 41-16 before a late Oliveira TD and two-point conversion.

Afterwards, head coach Mike O'Shea said if it had been a regular-season game, Collaros would not have returned to action.

"I know his finger almost came off and that was tough because he's trying to throw to me on the sideline with fresh stitches and whatever they used to numb his stuff," said receiver Drew Wolitarsky on Tuesday's locker room clean out day. "He was trying to throw to me on sidelines with his numb finger and it's just not Zach's throw.

"But at that position I would trust him over anyone in the league to go out and win a game if he has to. I just think that's tough. We're behind. We've got to take shots, and his finger is hanging on by a thread, if not hanging off. Blood is gushing everywhere… it's just tough. It's football. That's stuff you don't see as a fan and on the sideline you're going to try and do your best to lead the team. You're the general of the team. It's tough to do that when you're hurt. It's part of the game, though."

Collaros said there was a deep cut across the "line on his pointer finger. It was just kind of open. I could look inside my finger. It was weird."

The injury needed five stitches, and it was numbed to do that and then bandaged up before he put the glove on to return. Asked about his first throw after the injury being a deep shot, he said:

"Hindsight is 20-20, but I thought that play, in particular, was good for what Toronto was doing in that personnel set," he said. "They played a different coverage than what we thought. That being said, the throw to (Ontaria Wilson), the concept itself was still a viable concept."

Asked Tuesday if he wished Oliveira could have had more touches, Collaros said:

"I wish there had been more plays. I wish we had converted more second downs. I feel like we didn't play. I was talking to somebody (Monday) night and it just felt like I was on the field for 20 plays; it just didn't feel like a lot of football. And when you don't execute on second down and don't possess the football it's going to feel that way. We had a couple effective drives where there were explosives involved in there… that's typically the case on scoring drives. But you need to possess the football in a game like that to give yourself a chance I thought we still had a chance."

Oliveira met with the media for almost 10 minutes on Tuesday and his frustration was still very much evident.

"It's still hard to reflect on it. It's still fresh. It feels like a nightmare. I don't know how to put it into words" he said. "I think as the weeks go on, I'll start to make more sense of it but right now it doesn't make sense to me. It feels like a nightmare. I don't even know how it unfolded like that."

The Blue Bombers have been to five straight Grey Cups during Oliveira's career, but the last three losses have only further fuelled his frustration. His answer when asked 'what needs to change?'

"We've been to five straight Grey Cup and we're still extremely fortunate to be able to be playing in those games and going to those games," he said. "Guys play a long time in this league and don't end up going to even one Grey Cup. I'm still very thankful for that and thankful for this organization. But, yeah, we just can't finish.

"These last three losses, we just can't finish these games. I think there needs to be self-reflection and ways where individuals ask, 'Could I do more in big games like that?' Can the coaches do more? Can we prepare differently? Whatever it is. Obviously, what we're doing is working because we're getting to the game every single year. We've got one heck of an organization and one heck of a group, but we're just not finishing those big games. There needs to be a little bit of change, whatever that is, because obviously what we're doing isn't working."

Oliveira referenced several times during his session how the offensive line and the ground attack has taken over games in the past and repeatedly spoke of not getting the opportunity in the loss, especially with Collaros dealing with an injury.

"I know my ability. I know the offensive line that we've got, and I think that we can always take games over and win us games throughout the course of a season," he said. "It doesn't always unfold like that. There's going to be games where you have 20-plus touches and there's going to be games where you have 10 touches. You can win like that, and you can also lose like that. I have full belief in myself, and this offensive line and this team knows this — that we can take a game over at any given point if we have the opportunity to do so. I think we didn't have enough of those opportunities on Sunday, which is unfortunate because we've done it all year long.

"We do take games over. That offensive line, you let them work, you let them run off the ball and maul guys, that's what they do best. We could have done that more on Sunday. Obviously, there's other ways to win games but I did feel like in our game, that was our type of game, especially in the way the game was going — that was our game to take over. Unfortunately, we didn't get the chance to."

Oliveira said he didn't approach offensive coordinator Buck Pierce during the game to ask to be fed the ball.

"I don't do that. It's not right to do. I'm always going to be a team-first guy," he reasoned. "There's so many good abilities in this locker room, guys that can really do damage on this team on both sides of the ball that make an impact on this team. I just happen to be one of them. Whoever is calling the shots, however the game is going to unfold, I'm just going to strap on my helmet, buckle it up and go to work every single day whatever play is called."

Oliveira had 119 yards on 20 carries and an additional 22 yards on two receptions in the Western Final win over Saskatchewan.

Asked what message he would be to the higher-ups and coaches in the Grey Cup aftermath, Oliveira finished with this:

"My message would be whatever our blueprints to success, whatever gotten us to today, that's who we are, that's our identity. We need to just stick with it. We need to trust it because we trusted it all year long.

"And then we get to the biggest game of the year, and it's been the same recurring message over the last number of Grey Cups — what's gotten to where we are today? We trusted it throughout the course of the season. We get to the biggest game the year and we're not trusting it. We talk about that all year long, about trusting in it, trusting your teammates, trusting the work the work that you put in, trusting the preparation as well.

"We need to trust to what got us to where we are today. That would be my message."