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Explosive plays help Als top Argos in home opener

If there’s something we’ve learned about the Montreal Alouettes through two regular season games in 2026, it’s that they can be explosive in all three phases of the game.

On Friday night, they were able to collect their second win of the current campaign by topping the Toronto Argonauts, 37-30, in front of more than 21,100 fans at Percival Molson Stadium.

The Als (2-0-0) are the only team in the East Division without a loss to their name so far.

Video game numbers:

You want to talk about explosive?

How about quarterback Davis Alexander finishing the game with 441 yards passing and two touchdowns. The scary part is that he could’ve finished with a lot more yardage.

On two occasions, Alexander and Tyler Snead failed to connect on deep passes. Add just those two completions to their tally and the Als pivot would’ve gone over 500 yards.

“It was the first time in a while that (the opposing) team has given us those looks,” Alexander said of throwing the deep ball so frequently on Friday. “We wanted to take advantage. Unfortunately, I wasn’t accurate enough on a couple of passes. I know Snead will say he probably needs to make one of those plays, but that’s our group.”

Both of his touchdown passes were deep shots to Tyson Philpot, who finished the night with nine receptions for a ridiculous 193 yards.

Philpot’s first score, which went for 45 yards, occurred early in the first quarter, while his second trip to the end zone happened in the final moments of the game with the Als leading. The entire stadium was expecting the Als to try to kill the clock by running the ball on first down, but Alexander and Philpot opted for another home run ball that connected and put the game to bed.

“I was the only one running a route (on that play),” Philpot explained. “Usually at that time, we’ll either use the throws are off or throws are on. I asked Davis right before the play, and he told me that throws were on. That was all I needed to know. We went for the kill shot. We knew we needed a big chunk play, and that’s just a great play call from the coaches up top.”

Spreading the ball around

Alexander and Philpot will both grab most of the headlines for the numbers they put up, but other receivers were involved in the team’s success on Friday too.

With the Als trailing by six in the third quarter, Alexander was able to find Alex Hollins for a big second-down conversion and Jerreth Sterns for a pair of important grabs. They ended up taking the lead at the conclusion of that drive when backup quarterback Dustin Crum punched the ball in from the one-yard line.

Speaking of Sterns, he had an outstanding performance, as he finished with nine receptions for 114 yards in his first home game as an Alouette.

“Honestly, I just want to do whatever it takes to win,” the former Roughriders and Bomber, who signed with the Als in free agency last winter, said. “I don’t care if I get 10 catches or one catch. Obviously, we have some great players in the receiving room and Davis trusts all of us. Whoever he throws to, we have to make the play. I got a lot of opportunities today and I made the most of them.

Special teams break the game open:

Throughout the practice week leading up to this game, the Als were working on a way to block a punt.

Linebacker Micah Awe and Bubba Bolden worked in tandem during the three on-field sessions this week and both were convinced that they were going to make it work against the Argonauts.

Bolden admitted that the two discussed the play at length, and they were convinced that one was going to be able to block a punt in the game while the other was going to recover the loose ball. And it almost played out exactly like that.

With the Als up by one point in the final minutes of the game, Awe was able to block John Haggerty’s punt, but Bolden didn’t scoop it up in the end zone, Arthur Hamlin did. The reason Bolden wasn’t on the field was because he was replaced by Hamlin on special teams because he was needed more on defence due to an injury to Tyrice Beverette.

“All week in practice, Micah and I were going at it,” Bolden, who intercepted Chad Kelly in the second quarter, said. “I told him (the Argos) were probably going to key me. On that play, I wasn’t in, but Hamlin was in, and they set it up perfectly. Micah did his job and he did it all week. He was prepared for it. We spoke it into existence. That was probably the biggest play of the game.”

As for Awe, that was his first blocked kick since the beginning of his football career in seventh grade roughly 20 years ago.

“We designed it that way, but it didn’t work out that way the first time (we tried using it),” Awe admitted.

“We tried it earlier on (in the game). The play before, I messed up and didn’t do the right technique. I went to (special teams coordinator) Byron Archambault and told him I needed to do it another way. He told me to do it that way and the second time it worked. Bubba and I knew the whole week one of us was going to block and it (almost) happened just like that.”

It took the Als only two weeks, but they already have at least one touchdown in each of the three phases (Robert Kennedy III returned an interception for a touchdown last week in Hamilton).

What’s next?

The Alouettes will hit the road, again, as they’ll travel to Edmonton to take on the Elks on Saturday afternoon. The Elks are on a bye this week after they defeated the Ottawa Redblacks last week.