Lions part ways with coach Benevides

Nov 20, 2014 - 7:46 PM Vancouver, BC (SportsNetwork.com) - The BC Lions fired head coach Mike Benevides on Thursday.

The news comes after the Lions' season ended with a 50-17 loss at Montreal in Sunday's Eastern Division semifinal.

"Today, we made the very difficult decision to relieve Mike Benevides of his duties as head coach of the BC Lions," said Wally Buono, GM and VP of football operations. "Our football team experienced a very tumultuous season. Still, we believe as an organization that the team we had assembled was capable of more than what we accomplished in the regular season and in the playoffs. In short, we underperformed and failed to meet both our own expectations and the expectations of our fans."

The Lions finished the regular season at 9-9 and lost its playoff opener for the third straight year under Benevides, who inherited the job when Buono stepped down after the team captured the 2011 Grey Cup title.

Benevides compiled a 33-21 regular-season record in his three years as the Lions' head coach.