Cato to replace veteran quarterback Glenn as Alouettes visit Lions

VANCOUVER — Montreal Alouettes coach and GM Jim Popp hopes a quarterback switch will work as well for his team as it has for B.C. counterpart Wally Buono.

With Montreal (3-7) last in the East Division standings and the team’s offence in need of a spark, Popp decided this week to sit veteran quarterback Kevin Glenn and give youngster Rakeem Cato the start for Friday’s game against the Lions (7-3) at BC Place.

Buono made the decision last winter to go with Jon Jennings as his main starter instead of veteran Travis Lulay. The move has worked well so far as the Lions are second in the West and have already matched last season’s win total. 

The Alouettes’ change is not a sign Montreal is giving up on the season, said Popp, but a switch in approach from the years in which they would rely on the experience of Anthony Calvillo — now the team’s offensive co-ordinator — with no eye to the future.

“Through the Don Matthews and Marc Trestman eras, Calvillo played every single down even when we were up 40 points,” Popp said. “We didn’t know what we have. We need to know what we have for the future. At some point you have to do these things. Winnipeg did it this year (switching to Matt Nichols from Drew Willy at quarterback). Wally did it a number of times.

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“They’ve done everything they can to protect (Jennings). We’ve got to do the same thing.”

Cato will make only his 12th career start, but last year he led Montreal to only its second road win in 15 meetings against the Lions.

The leadup to the B.C. game has had some challenges. Cato and receiver Duron Carter engaged in a brief scrap at practice this week and veteran receiver Nik Lewis criticized the quarterback swap.

“(Carter) is a great guy but a quarterback has to do a little more and sometimes that means getting into his face,” Cato said of the confrontation with Carter, who returns to the lineup after serving a one-game suspension.

B.C.’s assignment against the mobile Cato will be more challenging than the less active Glenn. Conversely, Jennings will have to react quickly against a Montreal pass defence where as many as nine players often rush the quarterback.

“(The pass rush) can get into your mind if you don’t know what you’re doing,” said Jennings, who completed a season-high 84.4 per cent of his passes when the Lions beat the Alouettes 38-18 on Aug. 4 in Montreal.

Earlier this season, Buono sought some pointers from Trestman, the former Alouettes coach who’s now the offensive co-ordinator of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens. He asked Trestman about how to improve his team’s practice routine, which B.C. players say has helped the Lions to their fast start this year.

“It says a lot about Wally’s level of security to be able to call another coach because there’s a lot of coaches who are insecure,” said Lions linebacker Solomon Elimimian, who set a club record with 14 tackles last week against Toronto. “The pace of practice has been much different this year.”

Elimimian will square off against Montreal’s Bear Woods on Friday in a battle of the two top tacklers in the CFL.

Popp, meanwhile, took over as head coach midway through last season. He said there are no plans to make a change at this time, though he doesn’t plan to coach indefinitely.

“I’m only the head coach because I have an owner (Bob Wetenhall) who trusts me,” he said. “This year the whole point was to groom coaches on our staff, especially (Calvillo). The whole plan is to hire one of these (assistant) coaches or find another.”

First up, however, is finding the right quarterback.

Lowell Ullrich, The Canadian Press