By Noah Sidel,

MontrealAlouettes.com

The curse continues.

Despite breaking out to an early 17-3 lead, the Alouettes continued to be unable to win in Vancouver, as they fell 36-34 the to BC Lions in their eighth consecutive West Coast loss.

You’d have to go back to Aug. 31, 2000 for the Als’ last win on British Columbian soil.

That’s eight years, five Grey Cup appearances, one championship, five coaches and seven starting running backs ago.

Early on it looked as if the stars would finally align in the Alouettes’ favour.

BC scored on the opening drive, with kicker Paul McCallum delivering on a 30-yard field goal attempt, before Montreal replied with an Adrian McPherson goal line plunge.

From there, the Alouettes broke it open, scoring six on an eight-yard Anthony Calvillo-to-Kerry Watkins toss before Montreal kicker Damon Duval nailed a 43-yard three-pointer to put Montreal up 17-3 at the end of the first frame.

A second-quarter McCallum field goal would wrap up the first-half scoring as Montreal went into the locker room up 17-6.

The teams exchanged scored throughout the third quarter, but Montreal still carried a 27-23 lead into the fourth.

Then, as usually is the case in BC, the wheels fell off.

While Anthony Calvillo attempted to work his way to his 300^th career touchdown pass, his former teammate and close friend Barron Miles stole the show, picking off the Montreal quarterback twice.

Calvillo remained stalled at 299 career majors as his offence stalled for most of the third quarter.

As Montreal’s offence struggled, BC’s special teams game took over with former Alouette Ian Smart returning a Duval kickoff 92 yards to bring the Lions to within just a one-point deficit as they trailed 27-26.

Calvillo was able to respond with a 75-yard TD bomb to Brian Bratton, but from there, BC pivot Jarious Jackson and running back Joe Smith took over as the pair engineered a game-winning comeback with close to no time left on the clock.

The key play of the game came when Smith converted a third-and-two close to midfield, setting up a drive that would eventually lead to McCallum hitting a game-winning 36-yard field goal with just eight seconds on the clock.

The Alouettes next host the Hamilton Tiger-Cats on Thursday, July 31 at 7 p.m. (RDS, TSN, CKAC SPORTS, CJAD).

Click here for tickets