Breaking: Ticats’ Scott Milanovich sends a brutal message to players after ‘unacceptable’ preseason loss to Ottawa

Made threats to locate “countable” players after “unacceptable” special teams penalties in the preseason

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats hosted the Ottawa Redblacks on Saturday to begin their preseason, but head coach Scott Milanovich already felt the excitement of a fresh season fade.

The first-year bench coach told reporters after the game, “It felt fun right up until the point where we took about five penalties on special teams in the first quarter.” “Much to learn from. “You’re either coaching it or you’re allowing it to happen,” I told the coaches and players in there. Additionally, it won’t be permitted to occur.

In the exhibition game, the Ticats lost to Ottawa 31–22, largely as a result of discipline issues. The home team committed 10 infractions for 124 yards, easily winning the penalty margin. A large portion of that occurred during the third quarter of the game, when the Tabbies gave up 55 yards of free field position and earned five flags.

Making mistakes was expected, especially with so many rookies experiencing their first taste of CFL play. But in his first game in charge, the new coach of the Ticats could not have predicted the amount of mistakes that were made at Tim Hortons Field.

“Players will be assessed on special teams in addition to offense and defense. With so many players, special teams in preseason games are usually a bit of a problem, but Milanovich stressed that this was unacceptable.

You kind of anticipate a little bit of that. Although you won’t support it, it happened far too frequently. Over the season, it’s these two things—a lack of concentration and a lack of attention to detail—that ultimately cause you to lose. For this reason, we will either have to find guys we can rely on or we will have to improve as coaches and players.

Hamilton has struggled with discipline on a regular basis during the previous few seasons. With 163 penalty flags against them in 2023, the team not only committed the most on special teams (49), but also finished dead worst in the CFL. This contributed to the offseason reorganization that resulted in Milanovich being placed on the sidelines and Orlondo Steinauer taking over as president.

Paul Boudreau, who played for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in four previous Grey Cups, was brought in by the club to turn around special teams. Other than the deluge of penalties, his first performance was lackluster since Redblacks returner DeVonte Dedmon fielded a punt late in the first quarter and raced 91 yards unopposed for a return touchdown.

Global punter Bailey Flint received criticism for where he placed the ball during the play, but Milanovich was fast to emphasize how important it is to cover every kick.

He emphasized, “It was a little bit more in the alley, but we’ve got to cover those too. Obviously you’d like it by the numbers.” “Everyone is imperfect; we must address them all.”

It’s all in the details and playing without a penalty, in my opinion. I’m sure there will be a lot of focus on Coach Boudreau’s special teams, since they have led the league in six of the last seven years. This emphasis will continue through training camp.

Before the penalties erased those advances, the 51-year-old bench leader did see some promise in his team’s own return game. He thinks that after a protracted offseason, knocking off rust was the main cause of the problems, not effort.

“I thought the guys were giving it their all.” When players don’t play for a long time—a year, a month, or however long these people haven’t played—they just lose their discipline, technique, and basics when they get on the field, the speaker explained.

“I would anticipate seeing progress. We have two weeks to clean it up, but I’m not sure how much our starters will play the following week due to the short week after the preseason games.

The Toronto Argonauts will be the team the Ticats play their last preseason game against on Friday, May 31. After cutting its roster by midnight the next day, the team will get ready for their season opener on Friday, June 7, against the Calgary Stampeders.