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Friday’s game at Commonwealth Stadium is all about the battle for the No. 1 spot in the Canadian Football League.

But when the Edmonton Eskimos put their 4-0 record up against the B.C. Lions, who come in at 4-1, there will be a much larger figure reached.

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And if long-time Eskimos equipment manager Dwayne Mandrusiak wasn’t so humble, he’d probably grant interview requests on his four-digit accomplishment, rather than see it as a distraction to the team’s push for its first 5-0 start since 2011.

“It’s crazy, you know? Your thousandth game, you wake up one day and there it is, I guess,” said quarterback Mike Reilly, who had no such reservations about Mandrusiak’s milestone. “Dwayne’s been here for a long time, which is awesome. It’s something that you hear about when you first come here.”

Mandrusiak – followed by every member of his immediate family, at one time or another – began working with the Eskimos in 1970. To put it in perspective, that’s before both Eskimos general manager Brock Sunderland and head coach Jason Maas were even born, let alone any current player.