EDMONTON - Anthony Calvillo was asked to cast his mind back to the pall in the Montreal Alouette locker-room after the team lost the Grey Cup in 2000.
What, implored a reporter, would you have said if someone told you, "Don't worry, you'll be back another seven times?''
"I would've said, 'Yeah right,''' laughed the 38-year-old greybeard quarterback, who will suit up Sunday for his eighth CFL title game this decade.
"In 2000 it was my seventh year and it was my first Grey Cup,'' he said.
"We've been very fortunate to get back and win it a couple of times, but man, we keep telling these young guys 'Listen, this doesn't happen all the time. We're in a unique situation. And it ain't just because you dress up as an Alouette (that) you're automatically going to be in this (Grey Cup) game.''
Calvillo, slotback Ben Cahoon and offensive lineman Scott Flory are the only three Alouettes who will play in their eighth Grey Cup for the rouge, bleu et argent when the team cracks hats with the Saskatchewan Roughriders at Commonwealth Stadium (TSN, 6 p.m. ET).
It has been an unprecedented string of success for this franchise, which was born in 1946 _ a year after the Second World War _ and until the current decade enjoyed modest triumphs but a lot more heartbreak.
In four decades prior to the team financially collapsing and folding in 1987, the Alouettes won just four Grey Cups.
When the team was reborn a decade later _ with new silver helmets and distinctive snarling songbird logo _ it quickly took flight up the standings.
By 2000 the Als were back in the Grey Cup, losing 28-26 to the B.C. Lions. It was a double blow: the Lions became the first team to win it all after sporting a losing (8-10) record in the regular season.
Calvillo and Cahoon almost rescued the game. Calvillo hit Cahoon with a 59-yard TD pass with less than a minute to play to bring the Als within two, but they failed on the two-point conversion.
"That game was tough. Just the way it finished, that two-point play,'' said Flory. "I remember being in the locker-room, just crying. It's such heartbreak to lose a championship, lose such a close game.''
Two years later, they won it all, defeating Edmonton 25-16 in a game at Commonwealth Stadium that saw Calvillo hook up with receiver Pat Woodcock on a 99-yard TD pass pay.
"The 2002 team was a special team, there's no doubt,'' said Flory. "After so many years of frustration within the organization, it was such a relief to win that game.''
The Als went to the title game four more times in the next six years, all with the same result _loss, loss, loss, loss.
The stick-in-your-craw defeat was a 38-35 overtime game against the Edmonton Eskimos in 2005. It was a back and forth battle at B.C. Place Stadium. Als kicker Damon Duval booted a 28-yard field goal as time expired, but Montreal couldn't keep up with the Eskimos in overtime.
But last year the wheel came around, this time on the frozen turf at Calgary's McMahon Stadium.
The Alouettes won Grey Cup No. 6 over Saskatchewan in a tale already as famous as the '62 Fog Bowl and the Argo Bounce of '37. With no time on the clock and the Als down by a point, Duval missed wide right from 43 yards, but the Riders were called for too many men on the field. Duval got another shot, this time from 33 yards, and hit the ball true for a 28-27 win.
They're now back to win No. 7. Cahoon says their focus is just as intense.
"You don't take big games like that for granted,'' he said.
"We've kept a nucleus together, and it's a group of guys that are warriors that know how to work. It's not just guys who are competitors and want to win. They know what it takes to win.''
Notes: Free safety Etienne Boulay will start ahead of Matthieu Proulx, who injured his knee in the East Division final versus Toronto last week ... Oddsmakers have the Als favoured by as much as a touchdown, but then Montreal was a heavy favourite in last year's title game.
