The Winnipeg Blue Bombers are a Canadian Football League (CFL) team based in Winnipeg, Manitoba. The Blue Bombers play in the West Division of the CFL. Their home venue is IG Field and the head coach is Mike O'Shea.
📜 Winnipeg Blue Bombers History
The Winnipeg Rugby Football Club was founded in 1879, giving Winnipeg its first football team. Several decades later, in the 1930s, a new club with the same name was formed when several local clubs disbanded and merged together. The team was known as the Winnipegs, and in 1935 they reached their first Grey Cup. The Winnipegs defeated the Hamilton Tigers in that game, becoming the first ever team from Western Canada to claim the sport's top trophy.
The team's nickname also dates back to 1935, when Winnipeg Tribune writer Vince Leah referred to the club as the "Blue Bombers of Western football" in an article.
Winnipeg enjoyed several Grey Cup victories between the 1930s and the 1960s, winning the title 7 times from 1935 to 1962. This happy spell faded into a run of disappointing seasons, and although the Blue Bombers finished first in the West in 1972, they did not achieve that feat again until 2021.
The 1980s did see some success for Winnipeg, however. After a gap of 22 years, the Blue Bombers won the Grey Cup again in 1984, and followed that up with further victories in 1988 and 1990.
The 2000s saw several shakeups in coaching and management, as well as multiple changes of division for Winnipeg, as uncertainty over Ottawa's place in the CFL meant the Blue Bombers were moved more than once between the East and West Divisions. The establishing of the Ottawa Redblacks in 2014 allowed Winnipeg to return to the West, the team's historic home.
In 2013, the Blue Bombers hired Mike O'Shea as Head Coach. After a difficult decade, this move brought Winnipeg back into contention, and the Blue Bombers won the Grey Cup in 2019. The 2020 CFL season was cancelled due to the covid-19 pandemic, but Winnipeg picked up where it left off in 2021, winning a second consecutive Grey Cup. The Blue Bombers reached the final for a third straight year in 2022, but were defeated by Toronto Argonauts, losing the game by a single point.
