Steve Milton: Lots of talk during Grey Cup week that the Ticats will lose head coach to NCAA

As Grey Cup week hits full swing, there are dozens of delicious on and off-field tidbits floating around the CFL community, and here's a small sampling of them.

• Success always breeds wider interest. The Tiger-Cats aren't discussing it at all, and Orlondo Steinauer would never distract from his team's preparations, but there's a ton of noise about the Hamilton head coach moving to the University of Washington as the Huskies' defensive co-ordinator at the end of this season. Sports Illustrated is the latest to chime in, noting that Steinauer is a native of Seattle, worked with new Huskies coach Kalen DeBoer at Fresno State in 2017, has had a brilliant run with the Ticats, and would be paid almost three times what he makes now.

And the talk that Hamilton co-manager Shawn Burke is a strong candidate for vacant GM jobs in both Ottawa and Edmonton refuses to go away.

• How big will the ground battle be on Sunday? Likely enormous. Don Jackson has helped change the Ticats offence and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers have, of course, Andrew Harris. He's bound for the Hall of Fame, torched the Ticats with 18 carries and 134 yards and a touchdown in the 2019 Grey Cup and dominated Saskatchewan last week when 62 per cent of Winnipeg's plays were runs. But Hamilton's defence led the entire CFL in rush defence, allowing 79.6 yards per game.

• On his way to cover the Grey Cup, reporter Frank Stinisci, who owns and operates the football website, candidfranklivecfl on Zingo TV, lost his suitcase, laptop and camera equipment when they flew out of his vehicle when the hatch popped open somewhere near his Wasaga Beach home. A snowplow operator found the suitcase later, saw Stinisci's medication and looked through the bag for identification, called him and is bringing it all to Hamilton on Friday. Ross Anderson, the plow operator, was born and raised in Hamilton, is a lifelong Ticats fan and used to attend local stock car races with Angelo Mosca and Don Sutherin.

• When Ticats' dynamic first-year returner/receiver Papi White made the 92-yard return that put his team right back in the East Final, down only 12-6, it was his first punt return for a touchdown since he was a junior in high school. He never took any kind of kick to the house during his college career at Ohio University.

And, for the record, his given first name is Sefuan, but he explains that part of his heritage is Puerto Rican and Papi' has been his nickname since he was in middle school.

I had just come to a new school and no one knew me yet and my dad (Amari) was just saying it on the sidelines when he came to a practice," White told The Spectator. And nobody's called me Sefuan since then."

• After White scored on his punt return, Dave Evans was one of the first to embrace him and said after the game that it was extra special to him because of our Native American heritage."

Evans said during team interviews Thursday that his grandmother was forced to cut off her hair and was prevented from speaking our family's native language and when she died the language died out." Evans' family belongs to the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes. He grew up in Oklahoma and played college football for Tulsa. White was born in Seminole, Oka. His family is from the Chickasaw/Seminole Tribe.

People don't have to agree with me but I think it's import that more athletes in the game use their platform they have for the betterment of people, " Evans said.

• Scoring first is usually a big thing and over the regular season the team that got on the board first won 59 per cent of the games. But in the post-season so far, the team that didn't score first has gone on to win all four games ... including Hamilton twice.

• But there's also this: Don't let the Blue Bombers head into the final 15 minutes with a lead. In the last two seasons, including the 2019 Grey Cup win over the Ticats, Winnipeg is 21-2 when they lead after three quarters of play.

• Ticats offence co-ordinator Tommy Condell agrees that receiver Brandon Banks, the league's top player two years ago but playing through injury most of 2021, has been unleashing his best football of the season. When called upon, with and without the ball, he's done exactly what we wanted. People don't see the other things he's been doing besides catching the ball. He blocked great, came back for that catch in Toronto, and has run the defenders down field."

• Jeff Reinebold, who's been the Ticats' special teams co-ordinator for seven of their nine seasons since 2013, says the personnel department, led by co-managers Burke and Drew Allemang, has done an incredible job of getting us players, year after year, who are great on special teams. And those players make it work, not the coach." He cites the likes of Banks, Brown, Frankie Williams and others and says since 2013 there have been seven different returners take kicks back for touchdowns.

Steve Milton is a Hamilton-based sports columnist at The Spectator. Reach him via email: smilton@thespec.com