The Saskatchewan Roughriders have inched their way closer to what could be their first Grey Cup appearance since 2013.
The Green and White did what they had to do on a breezy Saturday night in Regina, beating the visiting B.C. Lions by a score of 28-19 in the West Semi-Final to book their ticket to next week’s West Final in Winnipeg in front of 26,123 fans.
The Riders will hope to do what no team has done in five years: beat the Blue Bombers in that game. Saskatchewan fans know that pain all too well, losing to the Blue and Gold in 2019 and 2021.
That’s a discussion for next week. For now, Rider Nation can celebrate their team’s first playoff win since 2021.
Here’s the good, the bad, and the dumb of the Riders’ West Semi-Final win.
The Good
It may have been Corey Mace’s first-ever playoff game as a head coach, but the rookie didn’t show any signs of being in over his head. Mace played a big role in ensuring his team would play at least one more game this season with some key decisions.
The biggest play of the game may have come before the contest even started. It was a windy night at Mosaic Stadium with the breeze causing an issue for both teams heading south toward the Maxtron. We saw that early on when Lions kicker Sean Whyte missed his first point-after attempt of the game following a touchdown on B.C.’s opening drive. Both kicking and throwing in that direction proved to be a challenge.
With that in mind, Mace made the correct call by giving his team the wind in the fourth quarter, even if that meant giving the Lions the ball to open both halves. His defence rewarded him by causing B.C. to go two-and-out on the first possession of the second half and the offence followed it up with a touchdown of their own. The whole thing played out perfectly for the Riders.
The wind made things dicey for the Riders at times in the third quarter — they had to survive plenty of time spent on their side of the field — but, to their credit, they held on as the Lions never regained the lead after taking it in the first quarter.
Once they got the ball back with the wind at their backs in the fourth, quarterback Trevor Harris quickly put together a four-play, 70-yard touchdown drive to put the Riders up 26-19. This led to Mace’s other decision to go for two following that touchdown to give his team a two-possession lead. Offensive coordinator Marc Mueller dialled up play-action to running back A.J. Oullette and Harris found a wide-open KeeSean Johnson for the conversion, which was a brilliant call.
Even some decisions Mace made that didn’t work out were still probably the correct ones. Toward the end of the first half, Mace didn’t concede a safety backed up in his own end. Unfortunately, the punt from Adam Korsak left a lot to be desired and the Lions scored a touchdown, but it was still the right call.
Later in the third quarter, Saskatchewan failed to convert a third-and-one at their own 49, but the football gods rewarded Mace for the decision as Whyte hit the upright for the second time and his team maintained its lead.
While players ultimately have to execute to win games, coaching can make a big difference. Mace pushed all of the right buttons on Saturday night.
The Bad
If there’s one thing you would have liked to have seen the Riders do in this game it was close it out on offence, something that has plagued this team often this season.
After forcing B.C. to punt with just over eight minutes and 30 seconds to go in the game, the Riders’ offence had the opportunity to make life much easier for themselves with a drive that ate the clock. In a perfect world, you would have liked to see them put together a touchdown drive to put the game away.
Instead, as they have many times before, they went two-and-out and lost six yards in the process. The whole sequence only took about a minute off the clock.
A battle-tested team like the Winnipeg Blue Bombers will make you pay for not putting them away. If the Riders find themselves in this situation next week at Princess Auto Stadium, they’ll have to be better.
The Dumb
Unfortunately — for this portion of the column anyway — it was a pretty well-played football game by both sides. Nothing too wild or wacky happened.
We also didn’t witness the continuation of some contests, since the CFL takes over with their sponsors in the playoffs for in-game entertainment. Their imagination more or less ends with trivia questions, so nothing fun happened there, either.
What did happen? Well, someone in the Maxtron room forgot what week it was.
Early BEEF!!! Aren’t Riders playing BC Lions??? #Riders pic.twitter.com/GsQ2qPThHE
— Belton Johnson (@bjizzle56) November 2, 2024
This is the playoffs — there’s no excuse for pre-season mistakes.
I have to give credit to former Riders offensive lineman turned CJME/CKOM radio analyst Belton Johnson for catching this, as I didn’t see it happen and it was corrected pretty quickly.
Maybe my colleague Ryan Ballantine in Calgary will count this as the Stampeders continuing their playoff appearance streak.
