It wasn’t supposed to happen this way.
The Hamilton Tiger-Cats were supposed to move seamlessly from Ivor Wynne Stadium to new, state-of-the-art digs.
But when political battles meant the team would have to spend a year away from Hamilton entirely as the new stadium was built on the site of the old one, Guelph was more than willing to get a year of CFL activity.
Alumni Stadium at the University of Guelph has been renovated to hold about 14,000 CFL fans at a time.
That influx of black-and-gold faithful – the CFL has scheduled the Tiger-Cats’ home games on weekends, allowing diehards to make the trek up Highway 6 – has local businesses seeing dollar signs.
“I’ll probably do ($1,000) in sales per weeks because of the Ti-Cats,” says Dino Scrementi, owner of Dino’s Athletic Direct.
In advance of Thursday’s night’s Guelph opener – a preseason tilt against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers – Hamilton players said they too were feeling the excitement.
“It’s definitely not Ivor Wynne, but there’s a different feeling,” quarterback Henry Burris told CTV.
“We’re looking forward to making this place home.”
The organization says they’re doing whatever they can to make the Royal City feel like the Ti-Cats’ real home – even setting up an office in the Guelph Chamber of Commerce building.
“Since February, we’ve been meeting just about once a week to try and help connect the Tiger-Cats in the Guelph community,” says chamber president Lloyd Longfield.
There’s another added bonus for Guelph fans – anyone taking a Guelph Transit bus to get to games is able to ride for free.
