Toronto must leverage their early season challenges to reshape perceptions and assert themselves against formidable Eastern Conference teams, delivering a strong performance despite tough matchups.
'Prediction is too pompous a word for it. What we are doing here is called guessing. And whatever you do guess will be less fanciful and ridiculous than what actually happens.'
The highlight of that, of course, is the 12-team College Football Playoff, now in its second year. The five highest-ranked conference champions, plus the next seven highest-ranked teams, will make the field.
In the end it took a 54th-minute try by the scrum-half Alex Mitchell to save his side's blushes in an encounter that will sit uneasily with the management at this delicate stage of the trip.
