Mitchell Blair
As the Saskatchewan Roughriders trudged off the field Saturday night, they knew they had let one get away. The defending Grey Cup champion Toronto Argonauts walked out of Mosaic Stadium with a hard-fought 31-29 victory in a game where the score doesn’t tell the story.
“This is a tough one to swallow,” defensive back Carlos Thomas uttered moments after the final gun. “They didn’t beat us tonight, we beat ourselves. We just have to go back to the drawing board and be more focused.”
Darian Durant did all he could do on the night. Despite throwing three interceptions, Durant threw three touchdowns including one in the waning seconds to Chris Getzlaf to close the deficit to two. Unfortunately for Durant and the team, they couldn’t convert on the two point conversion to hand the victory to the Argos. The frustration and disappointment was evident on the face of the Rider quarterback who damaged his throwing hand to an unknown extent after slamming it on a helmet in the second half.
It didn’t help Durant any that he didn’t have the services of Weston Dressler, who missed the game to recover from some nagging ailments, and Kory Sheets, who left the game with a knee injury. However, Durant would not use the absence of the diminutive receiver and the league’s leading rusher as an excuse.
“Shoulda, coulda, woulda,” Durant explained. “I don’t look at it like that. You’ve got to get the job done. Hats off to Toronto. They’re the defending champs for a reason. They came in and they got a tough win. There’s no doubt we missed those guys and (middle linebacker)Rey Williams, but if you look around the league there are key guys out all over the place. It’s about plugging guys in and making sure you don’t lose a beat and winning tough games.”
Riders Head Coach Corey Chamblin was also quick to point out that the absence of Williams, Dressler and Sheets was not the reason his team left the stadium as the losing team.
“We have 42 men on gameday, not three. “Chamblin said. “The guys who are in backup roles have to step up if they are called upon. I thought Neal Hughes did a great job stepping in for Kory. It doesn’t matter who we have out there, its professional football and we have to do what we can to win the football game. It didn’t come out that way tonight so we will go back and look at the film and re-evaluate.”
Linebacker Weldon Brown had a big night for the defense that was flying around for three quarters as he had four tackles, an interception and a sack. He gave rookie Toronto quarterback Zach Collaros a lot of credit, but he said they certainly helped him out.
“That kid’s a good quarterback. He managed the clock well and he showed a lot of composure,” Brown said. “I thought we were doing a pretty good job of handling him, but we shot ourselves in the foot a number of times because of penalties. We just have to be more disciplined. We don’t have to go back to square one, but a night like this shows us that they we will still have a lot of improving to do and we will do that.”
The loss is the second straight one for the team and drops their record to 8-3. They are now no longer in first place in the West as the Calgary Stampeders are one game up on them at 9-2. The next game will be a huge one for the football team as they meet the B.C Lions for the first of three games between the two this year next Sunday afternoon at Mosaic Stadium in a 230 start.
GAME NOTES:
- Chris Milo’s consecutive field goal streak ended at 28 when an attempt banged off the upright in the first half. It means Milo is now tied with Dave Ridgway for the club record in that category.
- Corey Chamblin said after the game the knee injury suffered by Sheets is believed to be minor, but that more would be known within the next couple of days
- Geroy Simon caught 5 passes on the night leaving him 6 away from having the all-time record for receptions currently held by former Alouettes great Ben Cahoon
- The orange flag was prevalent on the night as the two teams combined for 29 penalties with Saskatchewan having 15 of them,
