Argonauts' Chad Kelly determined to learn from 'nightmare' loss to Alouettes

TORONTO — The Toronto Argonauts woke up Sunday morning still reeling from a devastating loss to the Montreal Alouettes in the CFL's East final and know that they have to learn from the lessons the game provided them.

Sunday's end-of-season meetings gave everyone in the organization a chance to reflect on the missed opportunity to try to come to terms with the fact a historic regular season — where they went a franchise-best 16-2 — ended in heartbreak.

No player was feeling worse for not coming through than quarterback Chad Kelly, who was a big culprit in the loss with five turnovers in the game, including a fumble and four interceptions — two of which were returned for touchdowns.

One day later, Kelly still had a sick feeling in his stomach with what had transpired.

"Like I said last night, it feels like a nightmare and it's real," Kelly said in an interview with Sportsnet. "Reflecting on the season obviously, it was a good season but we came up short in the biggest moment and there's a lot to learn from that we can get better at. We'll figure out where we can get better and just go from there."

Kelly and head coach Ryan Dinwiddie went over the game film Sunday morning to get a better understanding of what went wrong.

Kelly admits that he could've put himself and the team in a better position with better decision-making.

"They didn't blitz once yesterday so I didn't have to throw hot. They were just playing coverage. Maybe I was definitely forcing things that I normally don't do," Kelly explained. "Trying to try to throw the ball down the field too much, rather than just take what they were giving me. It might not be sexy taking the underneath throw, but sometimes that's how you manage to win games just by managing those different types of situations."

What was more disappointing for Toronto was losing this game in front of the biggest crowd the team has ever had since moving to BMO Field, with 26,620 in attendance.

"We wish we could have given them a better product in front of home fans and myself personally in front of family and friends that travelled from Buffalo as well," Kelly said. "Next year, I hope they look forward to something even better and we will be better. We're going to get better from this. It's hard to swallow right now but we're definitely going to come out on the winning side."

"I'd love to see the crowd show up again, and more frequently, more consistently, because honestly, the energy in which they brought I was thankful, for," Brampton native Royce Metchie told Sportsnet. "I do want to thank them because they did hold us up even though we let them down and they held us in there for longer than we probably would have been without them.

"We're grateful to them and we know that if they come out again next year and continue to rock with us, then we promise a better result."

In the moments after the loss, Kelly said he received a lot of words of encouragement from teammates, coaches, and those close to him.

One notable message he got was from former teammate McLeod Bethel-Thompson, who was the starting quarterback that led the Argonauts to Grey Cup glory in Kelly's rookie season in 2022.

"I talked to a few people last night. I even got a text from Mac, which was kind of a real feeling, because you know, he cares and knows the kind of motions that I'm going through right now," said Kelly. "You try to rely on people that have been in that type of situation and have been through the fire and came out on the winning side. I'm just going to take some time to re-evaluate some things and figure out where I can get better, work to get stronger, and keep getting better."

No one has more belief that Kelly can learn from this loss than Dinwiddie, who as a former quarterback still remembers the tough losses he had back in his playing day.

He notes that some of the best quarterbacks to play in the CFL — including Anthony Calvillo and Damon Allen — suffered tough losses before they finally broke through.

"Chad is down on himself but that's because he knows he's the best player in this league and he didn't play his best last night.," Dinwiddie told Sportsnet. "Unfortunately, it happened to be the Eastern final but we know who Chad is, he's going be mentally strong, he's going come back, be better.

"He's only got 18 starts under his belt. He's still relatively new to the league so he's going to be better next year and I don't want this to linger for him."

Like any off-season, there will be changes made but Kelly will return after agreeing to a three-year extension in August. But while the wait for next season will be long than planned, Metchie believes the work needed to get better shouldn't wait.

"It starts with how we approach this week, instead of sitting around and waiting until like January, February to get into the off-season," Metchie said. "We just got to take this week to re-centre, set our goals in how we want this off-season to go, and try to get ahead of the two other teams who are playing next week."