They don’t call it the Labour Day Classic for nothing.
The Saskatchewan Roughriders and Winnipeg Blue Bombers put on another classic in front of a record crowd of 33,861 at Mosaic Stadium, with the Bombers escaping with a 35-33 win.
The Riders found another way to lose and their season quickly seems to be getting away from them. Nevertheless, it was an entertaining game that won’t soon be forgotten, thanks mostly to a quintessentially wild CFL ending.
Here’s the good, the bad, and the dumb of the Riders’ sixth loss of the season.
The Good
A week after getting stuck in neutral in Toronto, the Rider offence did show some signs of life against one of the league’s better defences.
In all, they managed 423 yards of net offence, including 31 first downs. That’s basically four times as many as they managed through the final 50 minutes of gameplay at BMO Field. Last week, they had just 112 yards of net offence after their first four drives of the game.
Trevor Harris finished the night 30-for-49 for 368 yards and three touchdowns. Four different receivers reeled in at least 70 yards worth of passes. They were four-for-five in the red zone when it came to scoring touchdowns.
Granted, a lot of that offence came from being down in the second half but it’s still progress. You’d like to see more consistent output throughout the game but overall, it was a step in the right direction.
33 points will win you many football games but it wasn’t enough on Sunday night.
The Bad
There are two major reasons why the Riders are now winless in their last six games and the obvious one is a mishandled punt by returner Mario Alford with four minutes left in the second quarter.
The kick from Blue Bombers’ punter Jamieson Sheahan was a knuckler to the corner below the 10-yard line and took a nasty bounce over Alford’s head. Out of instinct, he threw his hands up to catch it but ended up deflecting the ball toward the end zone where it was recovered by Nick Hallett for a touchdown.
Take that play off the board and the Riders probably win.
In a larger sense, it was their defence that let them down. They let the Bombers — who were averaging just over 21 points per game before this one — essentially score at will in the first half.
The Blue and Gold held a 29-14 lead at the half. Had quarterback Zach Collaros not left the game due to injury, the struggling veteran was on pace to throw for over 400 yards and make people forget about how lacklustre he’s been in 2024.
The defence did hold down the fort in the second half but with Chris Streveler at the controls of the Bomber offence, Winnipeg’s passing threat was more or less eliminated. The Bombers were also missing future Hall of Fame left tackle Stanley Bryant Jr. and the Riders only managed one sack on the night.
Three goalline stands saved the Riders from a blowout loss in Toronto last week, an injury to the other team’s quarterback may have spared them the same fate this week.
The Riders needed more from their defence and they didn’t get it.
The Dumb
There’s been a lot of talk about University of Colorado defensive back and wide receiver Travis Hunter recently. The Buffalo is currently one of the best players in American college football at both positions and he’s a throwback to an era when players regularly played both sides of the ball.
What Hunter is doing is impressive, but is it as impressive as what Micah Johnson did on Sunday night? You be the judge.
The Riders’ veteran defensive tackle was forced into action on the other side of the ball following injuries to centre Peter Godber and left guard Zack Fry.
With a blank number 57 jersey thrown on over his usual number 4, Johnson stepped in at guard and promptly blew open a hole for running back Frankie Hickson on his first play from scrimmage. Johnson remained a non-issue the rest of the night, though he did mostly act as the second man in on double teams. He was still effective nonetheless.
As good as Johnson was, the Riders certainly hope he doesn’t have to flip over to offence for a third time this season.
