Canadian football’s different kicking rules, where punts, kickoffs, and missed field goals that go into or through the end zone and aren’t returned out of it are worth a single point, have led to many unusual endings over the years. The most common version of a rouge in a tied, end-game Canadian Football League scenario comes from a team trying a field goal, missing it, but having it still go through the end zone, but that’s not what happened Friday. There, the Edmonton Elks opted to go for the punt single instead, and punter Jake Julien drilled that high and far enough that it went through for a walk-off overtime win over the Toronto Argonauts, leading to a memorable call from TSN’s Dustin Nielson:
“A WALK-OFF ROUGE TO END THE SEASON AND WIN IT FOR EDMONTON! THAT. JUST. HAPPENED!”
A walk-off punt in the @CFL. 🏈🎙️pic.twitter.com/nY9KRNT2gf
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) October 26, 2024
There’s long been debate over if the punt for a rouge or the field goal attempt is the right play to attempt there. As TSN analyst Glen Suitor notes on the call, field goal kickers usually set up about seven and a half yards back of the ball, while punters are a full 15 back. With Edmonton at the Toronto 34 here, this would have only been about a 41- or 42-yard field goal attempt (as in the CFL, the goalposts are at the front of the end zone rather than the back), while a punt here needed to travel at least 49 yards in the air to get to the end zone and 69 to go out the back (it’s a 20-yard end zone; however, going out the side would have been possible too). Punts in this case are rarely tried, and while they sometimes have worked out, they also sometimes haven’t.
But Julien (a Canadian punter in his second CFL season following a college career at Eastern Michigan) set the league record with 5,773 gross punting yards this season. Some of that was about the Elks’ struggles (even with the win here, they finished this season 7-11, although they were second in offensive yards per game and points per game), but he still averaged 54.0 yards per punt. (And punting yardage is tracked from the line of scrimmage, so that is 69 yards in the air from the punter’s position. So a punt at least as good as his average would have a chance, and the even higher longer one he hit to avoid Argos’ receiver David Ungerer III’s attempt to defend the rouge was perfect.)
Even more importantly, though, the Edmonton kicking game was unproven here: veteran Canadian Boris Bede had some struggles this year, connecting on just 78.1 percent of his field goal attempts (lowest of anyone with more than two attempts) and getting benched at one point, while global kicker Dean Faithfull (a converted English soccer player) only appeared in one game this year and only hit one of two attempts.
For this game, Bede was on the one-game injured list, while Faithfull was on the practice squad, so the Elks turned to rookie Canadian Vincent Blanchard for their field goals and converts. But he only had one field goal attempt (making it from 19 yards out) and one convert. And it’s understandable why, with a chance to win in overtime here after Toronto’s possession saw kicker Lirim Hajrullahu miss a 47-yard field goal and not get the rouge, Edmonton head coach Jarious Jackson opted to trust a more experienced player in Julien. And that led to this rare walk-off punt win.
[Awful Announcing on X]