On an icy McMahon Stadium surface, the Calgary Stampeders put a freeze on the Edmonton Eskimos' playoff run. The Stamps threw off the shackles of their own tragic history in yesterday's 33-10 win, advancing to next Sunday's Grey Cup game against the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.

"It's fairly simple,'' said Esks head coach Kay Stephenson, whose future with the team is uncertain.

"They played extremely well. I give them all the credit. They deserve it. There's certain things you have that are tough to do when you fall behind on a field like this.

"But what the heck, they played on the same field."

"There's a lot of unfinished work with this team and I'd like to be a part of it.''

Edmonton's defence simply could not contain Calgary quarterback Jeff Garcia and his talented receivers.

Garcia put up some major-league numbers as he systematically picked apart the Eskimos defence.

Even though he threw two interceptions, Garcia completed 32 of 46 attempts for 448 yards, and threw touchdown passes to Allen Pitts, Aubrey Cummings and Travis Moore.

He could see clearly ...

"I was really seeing things clearly downfield,'' said Garcia.

"The guys came up with the big plays on the short underneaths. I was playing my game, scrambling, reading, making it happen.

"I've envisioned how I'd play all week and when I got on the field, there it was.''

Despite giving up some major real estate in the first half, the Esks held in the red zone and were down just 16-1.

The Stamps played like a team possessed and they out-possessed the Eskimos 36 minutes to 23 minutes by the time the fat lady sang.

"Part of our game plan was to control first down,'' said Malvin Hunter.

"We did a decent job of that, but when you give up 18 yards on second down, it can destroy your game plan.

"Jeff did a good job of getting the ball to the guys in position to make plays. He was throwing the ball five, six yards that turned into 25-yard gains. Credit to him for getting the ball and credit to the guys for making the plays."

"It was apparent to everybody they did what they wanted to do,'' added Hunter. "We just didn't come up with the answers to stop him. When that happens, it makes for a long day - or a short season.''

The Esks mounted a brief comeback in the third quarter, as the momentum started switching. The offence looked good under David Archer, who tearfully explained this would be his last game as an Eskimo.

"We started moving the ball a bit and said to ourselves, OK, we're only down two touchdowns, we can still come back in this game,'' said linebacker Don Wilson.

"Then, they put it together again offensively and did some things. They executed, which is the most important thing.

"One game away from the Grey Cup, of course it's a blow. To make it here was an accomplishment in itself, but we wanted to get to the Grey Cup.''

Even though they held the ball for nine minutes in the third quarter, all the Esks could produce were Sean Fleming field goals of 33 and 15 yards.

All the scoring
"The short field goals, I think we needed to punch them in,'' said Fleming, who added a 19-yard field goal and a first-half 72-yard punt single to account for all the Eskimos scoring.

"We started getting some momentum but touchdowns would have been nice.

"The great thing is we turned it around and still had an opportunity. We started moving the ball. That was good to see.

We just gave up too many big plays and we didn't have enough big plays ourselves.''

In the final analysis, it was too little and not enough.

"We didn't play a high brand of football today,'' said Archer.

"We struggled early in the game. I didn't make enough plays. We didn't do it up right in the second half.''
 That was the game story and that was the microcosm of their season.

Summary:
 CALGARY (CP) -- CFL West Final Sunday afternoon:
 First Quarter
 Cal -- FG McLoughlin 15 6:10
 Cal -- FG McLoughlin 19 10:10
 Cal -- FG McLoughlin 19 13:09
 Second Quarter
 Cal -- TD Pitts 9 pass from Garcia (McLoughlin convert) 5:53
 Edm -- Single Fleming 76 8:13
 Third Quarter
 Edm -- FG Fleming 33 2:22
 Edm -- FG Fleming 15 13:54
 Fourth Quarter
 Cal -- TD Cummings 20 pass from Garcia (McLoughlin convert) 3:01
 Edm -- FG Fleming 19 5:40
 Cal -- TD Moore 47 pass from Garcia (McLoughlin convert) 8:24
 Cal -- FG McLoughlin 20 13:04
 
 Edmonton  0 1 6 3--10
 Calgary     9 7 0 17--33
 
 Attendance -- 31,121
 

CALGARY (CP) -- Statistics Sunday from the Eskimos-Stampeders West Final:
	Edm	Cal
First downs	12	28
Yards rushing	30	68
Yards passing	280	448
Total offence	310	516
Team losses	7	2
Net offence	303	514
Passes made-tried	24-39	32-46
Returns-yards	8-93	6-52
Intercepts-yards by	2-63	0-0
Fumbles-lost	0-0	1-6
Sacks by	0	1
Punts-average	9-43.8	5-41.4
Penalties-yards	9-64	3-20
Time of possession	23:49	36:11
Net offence is yards passing, plus yards rushing, minus team losses such as yards lost on broken plays.
Individual Stats:
Rushing:  Edm -- Mills 7-32, C.T. Williams 1-2, Archer 1-1, Wise 1-(minus 5);  Cal -- Anderson 15-44, Garcia 5-24.
Receiving:  Edm -- Wise 3-51, C.J. Williams 4-46, Diebert 4-43, Wiggins 3-43, Dowdell 5-36, Mills 3-35, Blair 2-26;  Cal -- Pitts 8-125, Vaughn 7-106, Moore 3-76, Anderson 8-56, Danielson 4-49, Cummins 2-36.
Passing:  Edm -- Archer 24-39, 280 yds, 0 TDs, 0 INTs;  Cal -- Garcia 32-46, 448 yds, 3 TDs, 2 INTs.