Alouettes look to start second half of season right against Redblacks

MONTREAL — The Montreal Alouettes seem to follow every step forward with a leap backward. It’s a trend defensive John Bowman wants to see come to an end in the second half of the CFL season.

Nine games in, the 3-6 Alouettes are last in the East Division. Bowman wants to start Montreal’s second half right when the Ottawa Redblacks come to Percival Molson Stadium on Thursday.

“The difference between good and great is consistency,” said the veteran Bowman, who signed a new one-year deal with Montreal in February. “That’s what I pride myself on, trying to be consistent. We have to try to string out a couple of wins.”

The Alouettes have been anything but consistent this year. They’re a CFL-worst 1-4 at home and have yet to record back-to-back wins. Each of Montreal’s three victories this season was followed by a lopsided loss.

An overall weak division, however, means Montreal is not far from the pack. The Argonauts, Tiger-Cats and division-leading Redblacks (4-4-1) all have just four wins on the season.

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Despite some poor results, Bowman believes Montreal has the right personnel to turn things around.

“Until they tell us we’re eliminated from the playoffs, that’s when we’re gonna give up,” he said. “We got a long ways, still nine games to go. I’ve seen a lot happen in nine games in this league before. We’re going to battle for it every week.”

Two weeks ago, the Als scored six touchdowns to rout Ottawa 43-19. Jim Popp’s men followed that performance with a 32-18 loss at home against the Blue Bombers, a game in which they failed to score any second-half points.

“We’re gonna have roller-coaster games and roller-coaster weeks,” said Montreal quarterback Kevin Glenn.”But it’s about getting over it and forgetting about it and moving forward and trying to be positive for the next outing. The inconsistency is across the board. It’s with every team.”

The Alouettes will be without star receiver Duron Carter on Thursday in the third and final matchup of the season between Montreal and Ottawa.

Carter is serving a one-game suspension for knocking over Redblacks head coach Rick Campbell during a touchdown celebration in a game on June 30.

Carter, who leads Montreal with five touchdowns and 717 receiving yards, appealed the suspension and has been playing ever since. An independent arbitrator rejected his appeal on Monday – 53 days after the incident.

At practice this week, Popp was critical of the timing of the decision.

“It’s in the middle of the week,” he said. “So when you’ve already had meetings, and you’ve had one of your only two practices prepared on the field, it becomes a team scenario. That’s the tough thing.”

Despite being first in the East, Ottawa has been far from dominant this season. The Redblacks have lost two games in a row and four of their last five since beginning the season 3-0-1.

Ottawa has made a habit recently of losing tight contests. Three of their last four losses, with the exception of the blowout against Montreal, have been by a combined 10 points.

Last time out, the Redblacks were sunk by a B.C. Lions touchdown drive in the game’s final two minutes. Three weeks earlier, Toronto kicked a 53-year-old field goal with 80 seconds on the clock to beat Ottawa in front of its home fans.

“We’re looking for a win in Montreal to go into the bye week with a winning record and then go from there,” coach Campbell told the team’s website. “We’re hopeful that if we keep working hard and tweak a few things and keep cleaning things up, we can compete with anybody.

“Lately we’ve been on the wrong side of close games that have come down to the last series of the game. Good teams find a way to make those plays late in the game.”

Kelsey Patterson, The Canadian Press