That’s it! Gene Hackman!

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/10/2010 (5793 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

MONTREAL — If the Winnipeg Blue Bombers had a suggestion box, yours truly would jot this idea down about solving the squad’s road woes and address it directly to head coach Paul LaPolice…

Yes, when a losing skid gets to eight games — Winnipeg hasn’t won on the road in seven tries this year and one more at the end of last season — then it’s time to forget about curfews and bed checks or superstitions like the pre-game meal or the route the bus driver takes to the stadium.

Instead, it may be time for LaPolice to channel his inner Norman Dale to inspire the troops to victory in enemy territory.

Norman Dale?

No doubt you remember Hoosiers, one of the greatest sports movies of all time, and the head coach of the long shot rubes from Hickory, Norman Dale. Well, in one of the flick’s classic scenes coach Dale — played perfectly by Gene Hackman — has taken his team to the state final in Indianapolis. And when he walks the lads into the mammoth gym, the kids go all wide-eyed and slack-jawed at the enormity of the building and, undoubtedly, the odds facing them.

So brilliant tactician that he is, Dale has his players measure the distance from the backboard to the foul line, then from the rim to the floor. Seeing his players stare back at him in bewilderment, he then utters this gem:

“I think you’ll find these exact same measurements at our gym back in Hickory.”

The players smile knowingly, Jimmy Chitwood makes a ton of baskets and bada-bing, bada-boom… Hickory wins the title in dramatic fashion.

Seeking a filter for this out-there idea — heck, everything else has been tried during the skid, hasn’t it? — we pitched it to the longest-serving Bomber.

“That’s not bad,” said Doug Brown upon the team’s arrival in Montreal Saturday afternoon. “We’ll probably try anything to get this right again.

“I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s because we’re such a young team and we have that same emotional fuel on the road as we do at home. Maybe we don’t have the mental toughness yet to win on the road. It’s hard to explain. It’s just different on the road. It’s hard.

“But I think it’s just as simple as every player having the maturity to ask of himself, ‘What am I not doing right on the road? And what can I do to change it? Maybe it’s changing your pre-game meal or how you prepare during the week, maybe your night-time activities have to be altered. No matter what the coaches and management try to surround us with or change, it boils down to the players.”

Now, there’s a thought. You see, if the Bombers are to salvage something of the 2010 season it’ll be up to the men in uniform against the Alouettes today to reverse an ugly trend that has seen the franchise go winless on the road for 370 days.

“We’ve got to come out smokin’ on all three phases,” said Terrence Edwards. “We know we can play with these guys and they know we’re not going to lay down for them.”

Four games left, two on the road, and a playoff spot still within reach.

And just for the record, Bombers, Molson Stadium in Montreal is 110 yards long and 65 wide and I think you’ll find these exact same measurements as your field back in Winnipeg.

ed.tait@freepress.mb.ca