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New Calgary Stampeders defensive coordinator Bob Slowik, a veteran who has coached in each of the past six decades across the NFL, CFL, and NCAA, has some lofty praise for the team’s new-look defence. 

Slowik joined Calgary back in 2021 as a defensive assistant, and was promoted after the team missed the playoffs last season. He replaced Brent Monson, who is now the defensive coordinator in Hamilton. 

The Stamps rebuilt the unit in the off-season, replacing almost every single starter from 2024. The only Week 1 starters from last year who remain on the roster are defensive lineman Charles Wiley and defensive back Bentlee Sanders, neither of whom has played this season. 

The early results have been promising. The Stamps (2-0) are first in the CFL in number of touchdowns allowed and second in points allowed per game.

Slowik says the unit resembles the first NFL defence he ever coached, back when he was a defensive assistant in 1992 with the Dallas Cowboys.

“We ended up winning the Super Bowl that year,” he said. “That defence was similar in that they were all no-names. No-names, no notoriety, just kind of an unknown to the league, and they took it by storm.”

Calgary takes on the Ottawa Redblacks on Saturday at 2 p.m. ET/12 p.m. MT on TSN1. 

This revamped Stamps’ defence hardly consists of household names beyond veteran defensive lineman Folarin Orimolade and defensive back Damon Webb, but the group is content with being anonymous and proving people wrong. 

Orimolade chuckled when told of his defensive coordinator’s lofty comparison of his unit to a Super Bowl champion, but said the hunger is perhaps similar.

“Part of it is internal drive and wanting to be better than what TSN or [other media] slate you as,” he said. “But also, all of us are coming from teams that didn’t want us…there’s a lot of people [on the Stamps] that haven’t won the Grey Cup at all. Just being able to have that opportunity, because you can go a whole career and you never get there. I know a lot of guys that want that opportunity. When you win it, you think, ‘Oh I won it. I can let off.’ But you actually feel like, ‘No, I want that feeling again because it’s such an elusive feeling.’”

Orimolade, one of the last links to Calgary’s 2018 Grey Cup title and fresh off another championship with the Argos, sees a focused unit.

“Everyone’s hungry,” he said. “Everyone does have a chip on their shoulder – even your more established players.”

“I feel like everyone plays with a chip on their shoulder,” added new cornerback Adrian Greene, who had a pick-six in Toronto and was also named the Canadian Football League Honour Roll's top player for Week 2. 

“Everyone, to some extent, has something they want to prove to themselves. Combine all that together, everyone’s playing for each other. Everyone’s working hard for each other.”

Greene, a former BC Lion, is acclimating to a standard in Calgary that Orimolade has helped create.

“Just getting to the ball,” Greene said. “Being relentless to the ball, constant communication, just that hard-nosed work ethic all the time. Usually things work out for you when you continue to play like that.”

Orimolade said that Slowisk has a simple game plan that newcomers can adapt to quickly.

“Complex enough to confuse offences,” he said. “It allows us to play fast, and everyone knows what they’re doing…we run hard, and we play with physicality. We stop the run first on D. From there, we keep them behind the [line of scrimmage] and just let our pass rushers go and make plays.”

Slowik credited the team’s position coaches for enabling the early success, as well as the players for buying in early on in training camp.

“New terminology, new defence, but by the same token, football is football,” he said. “The concepts are generally similar throughout the league.”

Orimolade pointed out that team walkthroughs, normally lighthearted affairs the day before games where players simulate plays while in workout gear, have been important.

“Being able to chat with each other like, ‘This is I’m supposed to do, this is what you’re supposed to do,’” he said. “Not coach-led always, but it’s also player-led. We can bounce ideas off each other. We kind of have an idea where someone else is going to be when the play is called.”

Off-field chemistry has also been crucial. 

Players watched Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final together on Tuesday (Greene said they were mostly cheering for the Edmonton Oilers) and went bowling earlier this season. Each position group has a bonding night once per week. Relationships formed off the field have an impact on the field.  

“When you like who you’re working with, and you get to know what they stand for, it makes it easier,” Orimolade said.

Slowik said there is something else that’s unique about this new Calgary defence. 

“Probably one of the most special groups, as far as chemistry goes, that I’ve been around,” the 71-year-old said. “And I’ve been around longer than dirt.”