The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

1 7 | Friday Decem ber 1, 2 0 1 7 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insidehalton.com Kevin Nagel Sports Editor sports@oakviNebeaver.com Sports Hajrullahu would kick a field goal that would give the Argos a 2 7 -2 4 victory. In a sport known for planning, it was the unexpected moments that led the Argos to victory and helped second-year Argo Cross earn his first Grey Cup. No one could have anticipated Cas sius Vaughan' s 109-yard fumble return that set up Cross' game-tying two-point convert. Or for the Argos scoring 11 un answered points in the last five minutes to win. "That' s what' s great about a CFL game," said Cross. "A team can be up two or three touchdowns with three minutes left and all of a sudden a team comes back. You always have a chance. It was a classic CFL game." Certainly no one could have expected that a team that didn't have a coach or a general manager four months before the season began would win the Grey Cup. Toronto eventually hired GM Jim Popp and coach Mark Trestman, the architects of back-to-back titles in Mon treal. The Argos had a rocky start, going 4 -7 , but rebounded to win seven of their last nine, including Sunday' s win over Calgary, which had beaten Toronto in both previous meetings this year. "I think that' s a testament to owner ship and our coaches and how they pre pared us for the season," said the Holy Trinity graduate. "We had to go through adversity to see how we'd respond, and then just as important, see how we "Connected to your Community " Cross makes key catches in Algos' Grey Cup victory By Herb Garbutt Oakville Beaver staff This was not a part of the plan. Football coaches and players are noto rious for their planning. Prepare for ev ery possible scenario. Don't just draw up a play. Draw up a play, but have a Plan B, C and D built in, just in case. W hen the Toronto Argos set up with an unbalanced line for a two-point con vert in the final minutes of Sunday' s Grey Cup, the plan was to confuse the Calgary Stampeder defence and leave quarterback Ricky Ray with an open receiver he could hit with a game-tying pass. "But Calgary' s got a smart defence," said Oakville's Declan Cross. "They picked up on it. They knew who was (an) eligible (receiver)." Ray took the snap and dropped back, but his primary target was covered. W ith the pocket collapsing around him, he took his only remaining option and rolled to his left. "W hen Ricky had to pull it down and escape, I was about 10 yards deep in the end zone," Cross said. "I knew I had to run toward him ." As he ran back toward the goal line, Ray fired a pass. Cross slid across the snow-covered turf of Ottawa' s TD Place to make the catch and tie the game 2 4 2 4 with 4 :2 0 to play. W ith less than a minute to play, Lirim Oakville's Declan Cross and his dad Paul lift the Grey Cup after the Toronto Argonauts 27-24 comeback win over the Calgary Stampeders Sunday. Cross, a second-year fullback, caught five passes for 36 yards, including a pair of two-point converts. | photo submitted would respond to success." The Argos responded well to both, landing them in Sunday' s final. Cross said as m uch hype as there was leading up to the game, once the game started, it was just another football game. He focused on his job and did it well. He made five catches -- just one below his career high -- and two of them put points on the board. He also caught a two-point convert in the third quarter that cut Calgary' s lead to 17-16. "It really wasn't until after the game, you look and think `This was the Grey Cup,'" he said. "It' s amazing to happen so early in my career. I'm very fortunate. There are guys who have played six, seven, eight, nine years and haven't won before, so it was incredible to win for them ." McEachran wins first World Cup slopestyle medal Evan M cEachran earned the first World Cup medal of his career, taking the silver at the FIS Freestyle Ski slopestyle event in Stubai, Austria Sunday. "The weather wasn't amazing today so I didn't have great training and in my first run I didn't have speed," said the Oakville skier. "So I decided to im provise my second run and somehow managed to put it all together and end up in second." Having to contend with wind and blowing snow, M cEachran began his second run with a switch left double 1260 to left double 1080 mute. M cEachran went on to earned a score of 8 6 .2 0 , second only to X Games champion Oystein Braaten (9 1 .4 0 ) of Norway. American Colby Stevenson was third with a score of 81.80. "It' s a huge weight off of my shoulders, especially being an Olympic qualifying year it' s really stressful to get a podium," the 20-year-old said. "This is my first podium in four years so it feels insane and I am just excited to go ski for myself. I think I'll be able to put down m uch better runs in the coming events." That previous podium came in on the develop mental Nor-Am circuit, in Aspen, Colo, in February 2014. M cEachran's previous best in a World Cup event was eighth, which he had accomplished twice, most recently in February in Quebec City Coming off a 15th place finish at the season opener in New Zealand, M cEachran set himself up well for the final with a score of 91.33 in qualifying, a mark that was only bettered by Sweden' s Jesper Tjader. "It' s been a pretty amazing weekend, to say the least. I felt really good skiing in practice, then in qualifiers I managed to land my dream run on this course, so that felt awesome," he said. "Then my second run in qualifiers I got to step it up a little bit and put myself in a better position going into finals." Next up on the slopestyle calendar is a Dew Tour event in Breckenridge, Colo., Dec. 14-17, followed by a World Cup in Font Romeu, France Dec. 23. -- Herb Garbutt, Oakville Beaver Evan McEachran competes in his qualifying run in Stubai, Austria. He went on to take the silver medal. | photo by Mateusz Kielpinski - FIS Evan McEachran won the silver medal at Sunday's World Cup slopestyle event. | photo by Freestyle Canada