Charleston Hughes is making up for lost time.
For 10 CFL seasons, Hughes wasn’t able to hit Calgary Stampeders quarterbacks because he was a member of that team’s defence — and smoking one’s teammates in practice wouldn’t be well-received.
Now that Hughes is with the Saskatchewan Roughriders, though, he can get after the Stampeders’ pivots as much as he wants. And it would seem that he wants to do that very much.
Hughes sacked Bo Levi Mitchell twice during Saskatchewan’s 40-27 victory over Calgary on Sunday at Mosaic Stadium, giving the veteran pass-rusher four sacks in two games against the Stampeders this season. Hughes also got to Mitchell twice on July 28, when Calgary beat the Roughriders 34-22.
“(After) all those practices I had against Calgary when I was yelling ‘Sack!’ and then he was saying, ‘No, you’ll never get me,’ go ask him what happened now,” Hughes said with a grin after Sunday’s victory.
On Feb. 2, the Stampeders traded Hughes to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, who subsequently dealt him to Saskatchewan. The 34-year-old has produced consistently for the Roughriders, recording a CFL-high 11 sacks so far this season.
Hughes already has matched his league-leading sack total from 2017 and has reached double digits for the fourth straight season and the sixth time in his career. He also has tied Tyrone Jones for ninth on the CFL’s all-time list with 110 career sacks.
On Sunday, some of Hughes’ teammates were jokingly calling him ‘thief’ after he helped the defence record five sacks and harass Mitchell throughout the contest.
“That’s an in-house thing,” Hughes said. “I can’t tell you why they’re calling me a thief. I just know that (I’ve got) 11 sacks in eight games, so I feel good about myself right now.”
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The Roughriders’ offence scored just one touchdown Sunday, but it turned in one of its best showings of the campaign to date.
Saskatchewan had a season-high 19 first downs, Zach Collaros’ 270 passing yards were the most by a Roughriders quarterback this season, and the 381 yards of net offence were the second-most generated by Saskatchewan so far in 2018.
The Roughriders also tried to push the ball downfield more than they had in previous games, they didn’t allow a sack and their one turnover didn’t lead to any Calgary points.
“We felt after the (Aug. 2) game in Edmonton that we were, at least offensively, getting to where we wanted to go,” said Collaros, who returned from the six-game injured list early to run the offence against the host Eskimos.
“Defensively all season long, we’ve played really good football and obviously (on) special teams as well. I think we held up our end of the bargain (Sunday) offensively — but we have to score touchdowns and finish drives.
“The way we practised all week, if we can sustain that for the rest of the season, we’ll like the results.”
Not everything went well for the offence Sunday, though. Slotback Caleb Holley left the contest in the first quarter with a knee injury and didn’t return.
“It doesn’t look good,” said head coach-GM Chris Jones, who couldn’t elaborate.
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The victory Sunday created a lot of confidence among the Roughriders, but Jones reminded people not to get ahead of themselves.
After all, Saskatchewan is only 4-4-0 and still sits fourth in the West Division.
“Let’s be careful (not) to anoint us that we’re going to the Grey Cup,” Jones said. “Last week, (league observers) had us probably finishing last in the league. This is one game on a long journey. The good thing is we get to face all these Western opponents face to face.
“We’re a good football team, just like I told everybody two (or) three weeks ago. We just stubbed our toe a few times and we’ve got to learn to win games.”
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Jones abandoned his traditional all-black attire Sunday, wearing the league-issued green T-shirt that honoured ex-Roughriders running back Neal Hughes as part of the CFL’s “Diversity is Strength” campaign.
Not surprisingly, the players told Jones after the game that he has to wear green every week now that the team has won with him in that colour.
To Jones, the theme of the shirt was more vital than its hue.
“It’s an important message for our league and our commissioner and the governing body; they think very strongly of the diversity program,” he said when asked why he wore the green T-shirt. “It stands for something really good and it’s something that I believe in, too.”
Hughes, who is Metis, was the face of the CFL’s diversity campaign in Saskatchewan this year. He was one of 12 people honoured by the league over the weekend for their work in breaking down societal barriers.
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On Monday, the Roughriders announced they had acquired national receiver Brian Jones from the Toronto Argonauts for a seventh-round pick in the 2019 CFL draft.
Jones, a 24-year-old product of Enfield, N.S., was a first-round pick (fourth overall) by Toronto in the 2016 CFL draft.
The 6-foot-4, 233-pounder out of Acadia University has 12 receptions for 128 yards and one touchdown in 24 career regular-season games as well as nine special-teams tackles.
Jones joins a receiving corps that is building up its national depth. Josh Stanford and Devon Bailey have been on the roster all season, Mitch Picton has been on the practice roster since training camp and Rob Bagg recently was re-signed after being cut at the end of camp.
