Ottawa LB Reed to face former Calgary teammates in 2016 Grey Cup game

OTTAWA — Taylor Reed’s season began with the Calgary Stampeders and will end Sunday against them.

Reed expects to play Sunday when Ottawa faces Calgary in the Grey Cup at BMO Field. An upper-body injury knocked the rugged linebacker out of the Redblacks’ 35-23 East Division final win over the Edmonton Eskimos on Sunday but Reed said the unspecified ailment wasn’t major.

“I’ll get a little treatment and it’ll be good,” he said. “My defence is getting on me saying I should’ve sucked it up and gone back in but (Sederius Bryant) did a great job coming in and I knew he could get it done.

“I knew this defence and this team could get it done. All’s well that ends well, we’re going to the Grey Cup.”

The six-foot, 241-pound Reed opened 2016 with Calgary after signing with the club as a key free agent in the off-season. Reed played 10 games, registering 40 tackles, two sacks and one forced fumble before being released with the emergence of rookie Alex Singleton.

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But Reed wasn’t unemployed long, signing with Ottawa less than 24 hours later. In nine games, including eight starts, the native of Beaumont, Texas, has 39 tackles and a sack for the Redblacks.

The former SMU star holds no grudges against the Stampeders and won’t have an axe to grind against his former team come Sunday.

“Playing against Calgary will be crazy because a lot of those guys I’m still friends with,” he said. “There’s no animosity by no means.

“Right now, we’re just trying to make sure we get our families and the people we want to take (to Toronto) and all the logistics of that. But this week will be preparation first and I’ll worry about the Grey Cup when it’s gametime.”

Reed will make his second Grey Cup appearance looking for a much different outcome. He appeared in the 2014 contest as a rookie with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats and it was Reed’s crucial illegal block penalty that negated Brandon Banks’ 90-yard punt-return TD and allowed Calgary to capture a 20-16 win at B.C. Place Stadium.

“Going back (to Grey Cup) means a lot,” Reed said. “Obviously I’ve been there before and was on the losing side of it.

“And the way it happened, I definitely want to get that win for the city of Ottawa and myself.”

To his credit, Reed made himself available to reporters following the disheartening loss and dutifully answered every question. While he’s grateful to get a second chance in the Grey Cup, Reed doesn’t lie awake at night replaying the 2014 title game.

“It’s old,” he said. “It’s funny because going to Calgary they jokingly kind of gave me a little ‘Thank you,’ but I don’t think about it too often.

“It’s been what, a couple of years now? I’ve been on two other teams since then so I don’t think about it.”

In fact, Reed, 25, believes his Grey Cup experience could help the Redblacks.

“I think being a veteran and having been there before I can help the young guys who haven’t been there or any of the guys who haven’t been there,” he said. “We just have to make sure as a team the game isn’t too big for us.

“That’s it.”

Ottawa (8-9-1) will make its second straight Grey Cup appearance — losing 26-20 to Edmonton last year — despite becoming the first team in CFL history to finish atop a division with a sub-.500 record. By comparison, Calgary topped the West with a league-best 15-2-1 mark and was 1-0-1 versus the Redblacks.

Calgary has already been listed as a nine-point Grey Cup favourite, which is just fine with Reed. 

“Underdog, favourite, it doesn’t really matter,” he said. “Obviously, Edmonton was favoured (in East final) and that’s why you have to play the game.

“You hear it all the time. You can do all the predictions, statistics, all the things you want to do. But at the end of the day those two teams still have to play the game and anything can happen.”

Dan Ralph, The Canadian Press