The good, the bad, and the dumb of the Saskatchewan Roughriders’ 16-12 win over Montreal

Photo: Tanner Piper/3DownNation. All rights reserved.

Despite their best efforts, the Saskatchewan Roughriders have secured their spot in the 2026 Grey Cup playoffs.

It was perhaps the worst game of the entire CFL regular season to date, but the Riders don’t care, as the 16-12 win over the Montreal Alouettes not only ended the team’s four-game losing streak but officially clinched a playoff spot thanks to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers’ loss to Edmonton last night.

Would the Riders have been able to win this game if the Alouettes didn’t rest Davis Alexander, Tyson Philpot and Tyler Snead? We’ll never know for sure. Not if they played the way they did for 58 minutes; that’s for sure.

There’s still plenty to worry about when it comes to this team and whether they truly have a chance to make noise in November. At least at this point, Rider Nation knows they’ll see their team play one extra game this season.

Here’s the good, the bad, and the dumb of the Riders’ ninth win of the year.

The Good

The Riders found a way to win. That’s about all you can say that went right for the Green and White on an unusually beautiful late October afternoon at Mosaic Stadium.

You could sense the angst and frustration from Rider Nation all game long, as the offence continued to be largely ineffective, as it has been for the last few weeks. It wasn’t until their final drive of the game that the Riders finally made their way to the red zone. It was their first meaningful trip to the scoring area since they played the B.C. Lions in Vancouver.

They didn’t make it easy on themselves as Trevor Harris and company had to convert a third-and-10 from their own 52 to even keep the drive alive. Two plays later, Harris shocked the world when he took off for a 22-yard run that set up the Riders to at least tie the game. Harris found Keesean Johnson in the end zone on the next play to give the Riders their first lead of the day.

That run was the moment we’ve been waiting for from Harris. The 41-year-old had a bad day, and hasn’t been playing to the expected standard since the team’s Labour Day weekend win over Winnipeg. When things aren’t going the team’s way, there comes a time when a quarterback needs to single-handedly will his team to victory. Perhaps Harris was inspired by Darian Durant being in the building as he took off for that run like Durant did numerous times in the fourth quarter of the 2013 West Semi-Final. Harris is never going to be Durant stylistically, but for one brief moment, he dug deep and made it happen.

That’s the kind of leadership you want to see from the team’s most important player in the game’s biggest moments.

The Bad

There’s a lot that went wrong for the Riders in this game. As mentioned, Harris had a rough game, perhaps his worst in this stretch. Throws were off, and nothing was getting pushed downfield. Even with the team’s big three receivers back in the lineup, there wasn’t much going on offensively. Harris didn’t cross the 200-yard passing mark until late in the fourth quarter.

Defensively, they were just good enough to keep the team in the game, but gave up a lot, including 109 yards rushing from Shomari Lawrence. Dustin Crum had the game you’d expect from him at this point in his career, but he still found Alexander Hollins for a 37-yard touchdown in the first quarter.

Perhaps the most concerning thing, however, is that you didn’t get a sense of urgency from Corey Mace and his team. While a certain amount of level-headedness is required in professional sports, this was a game the Riders needed to win to not only clinch a playoff spot but reset their own psyche, but it never felt like it.

You would have expected to see a little more fire, a little more intensity, someone stepping up to make something happen in a big moment.

They seemed content to keep this game moving at a snail’s pace. It felt more like a preseason game at times, something that the Alouettes were fine with, as they just wanted to get this over with. You would have liked to have seen more of a spark from Saskatchewan, especially against an undermanned Alouettes squad.

The Dumb

The Riders just about had their own Larry Thompson moment.

You might remember that after Thompson had officially acquired the Edmonton Elks and became the team’s first-ever private owner, part of his celebration was to drive an old team-branded fire truck through the Calgary Stampeders bench during his first game.

On Saturday afternoon, the Riders honoured 2026 Plaza of Honour inductees Paul MacCallum, Rob Bagg and Dan Clark at halftime.

Afterwards, the three hopped into carts as they usually do to be paraded off the field, except this time the carts looped down the Alouettes sideline as the team was making their way onto the field for the second half. A few of the Als seemed surprised and had to quickly get out of the way. It was nearly a disaster.