Crunch time for the Tiger-Cats

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats' ship hasn't sunk yet, but the water's rising. Their loss to Edmonton last week has left them at 5-9 with four games to go; if the season ended today, they'd miss the playoffs thanks to the 6-8 Eskimos crossing over, and they also have to watch out for the onrushing Winnipeg Blue Bombers, just a game back at 4-10. That puts a lot of pressure on them heading into Friday's clash against the B.C. Lions (7:30 p.m. Eastern, TSN/ESPN3). It's not quite a must-win, as there are still scenarios that see them in the postseason even with a loss here, but a home game against a banged-up B.C. squad might be a crucial opportunity for this squad to get back on track.

What exactly's wrong with the Tiger-Cats? Well, that's not easy to pinpoint precisely. The principal culprit is the defence, and it certainly deserves its share of the blame; through 14 weeks of play, Hamilton ranks last in 13 of the 25 team defensive statistics tracked weekly by the league, including points allowed (444, 31.7 per game), touchdowns conceded (44), first downs given up (336) and yards of net offence allowed (5858, 414.4 per game). Some of that's thanks to injuries, but every team has to deal with injuries, and the Ticats' defence has been generally ineffective even when their top players aren't hurt.

However, the Hamilton offence hasn't been all sunshine and rainbows, either. It fares much better from an overall statistical perspective (they lead the league with 30.1 points per game), but that's thanks to its Jekyll-and-Hyde nature. When the impressive side of the Tiger-Cats' offence shows up, they're almost unstoppable; you get games like the one against Montreal two weeks back, where the "Good Hank" side of Henry Burris came out and he completed 88 per cent of his passes. On other days like this past week's game against Edmonton, though, it's definitely "Bad Hank" under centre; Burris threw three interceptions that proved critical turning points in Hamilton's loss. It's not just Burris, of course; sometimes Hamilton's receivers have underachieved, while sometimes the blocking or the ground game hasn't quite been there. Still, the primary source of the Tiger-Cats' spectacular inconsistency would appear to be the alternately stunning and deplorable performances turned in by their quarterback.

While Friday's game represents a great opportunity for the Tiger-Cats to make up some ground in the playoff chase, winning is still going to be an incredibly difficult task. Sure, Hamilton's 4-3 in the friendly confines of Ivor Wynne Stadium (not the greatest record in the world, but much better than their 1-6 road performance thus far in 2012), and sure, the Lions will likely be without stars like Arland Bruce, Geroy Simon and Khalif Mitchell, but this is an incredibly deep B.C. team and one that's 10-4 on the season. They're also 4-3 on the road, the only CFL team to be over .500 there this season. The Tiger-Cats certainly could draw inspiration from the crowd and pull off a win Friday that vaults them back into the playoff picture, but they're going to need a special performance to do so. Given their track record to date, it's anything but certain they'll get one.