Rob Vanstone: Remembering Ronnie and the mother of all Roughriders games — 16,296 days later 

Resplendent in green, we boarded a bus on a Saturday to embark on a Saskatchewan Roughriders-focused journey to Edmonton. 

It could have been this past weekend or, for that matter, 2,328 weekends ago. 

The most-recent excursion could not have been foreseeable on the morning of Oct. 28, 1978, when Dad dropped off Helen Vanstone and her non-prodigy of a son in the Southland Mall parking lot, where an Alberta-bound bus was parked. 

Way back when, thanks to the wonder that was Dash Tours, it cost us $50 each for a game ticket, a one-night hotel stay, and a Kentucky Fried Chicken snack-pack. 

You couldn’t beat the prices. And few teams could beat Edmonton. 

The Eskimos (now Elks) would soon win their first of an unprecedented five consecutive Grey Cup championships. 

As for the Roughriders, their glory years had come and gone. George Reed had retired shortly before the 1976 CFL season. Ron Lancaster was poised to dress for his final game, to be played at brand-new Commonwealth Stadium on the afternoon of Oct. 29, 1978. 

The bus was half-full. The glass wasn’t half-full. I feared that the proceedings would be unwatchable. It was that kind of year. 

But we went to Edmonton, anyway, because that’s what we did back then.  

That’s what we loved to do, even if the game was devoid of meaning (at least in terms of the standings) for our beloved Green and White. 

Six days earlier, Ronnie had made his final appearance as a player at Taylor Field, in relief of Larry Dick. Then-Roughriders head coach Walt Posadowski opted to start the 22-year-old rookie passer because he had been anointed the heir apparent to The Little General, who had all but confirmed that he would soon be retiring. 

With the offence sputtering in the fourth quarter against the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Posadowski turned to Lancaster, even though he hadn’t even warmed up on the sideline. 

It did not go well. Discontented voices were heard from the stands after No. 23 threw a costly interception. The grumbling persisted after a 13-7 loss left the Roughriders with a 3-11-1 record and one more obligatory game on the schedule. 

With that as a backdrop, off we went for Edmonton.  

Fast forward to this past Saturday morning. 

The bus — the buses, actually — transported the Roughriders’ travelling party (yours truly included) to Regina International Airport, where we boarded a chartered, Edmonton-bound WestJet aircraft. 

Sitting on the right side of the bus, six rows from the front, I tried to imagine what Mom would make of all this. 

When I was offered an opportunity in February to join the Roughriders’ organization, my immediate inclination was to call Mom and excitedly tell her.  

There have been countless comparable moments since Dec. 11, 2019, when Mom passed away. If there is good news, especially, I want her to be the first to know. It is always a jolt, then, when I am rudely reminded that we have lost her. 

But it still seems like she is here. There was that overwhelming sensation on Saturday. I could almost see her standing outside the team buses, waving at us, and beaming with pride. 

While the mind flashed back, the bus moved ahead, toward the airport. Then, as WestJet likes to say, we were up and on our way. 

Not long after the team landed at Edmonton International Airport, a small group of us took a shuttle bus to Commonwealth Stadium for a day-before-game media availability. 

As quarterback Trevor Harris, receiver Derel Walker and Head Coach Craig Dickenson took turns being interviewed by TSN, I turned back the clock. Standing at field level, I looked at the expansive stadium and pinpointed some landmark locations. 

Mother and son had sat on the other side of the field, in the second-last row of an end-zone section. 

Above us, nearly 45 years ago, was a replay screen that was revolutionary at the time. The images were in black and white, although they have long been colourized in green. 

Edmonton’s CFL team had actually opened the 1978 season with antiquated Clarke Stadium as its home facility. The final six regular-season contests had been played at new Commonwealth Stadium. 

Sellout (or near-sellout) crowds were routine at what was then a 42,000-plus-seat, state-of-the-art facility. It was a tough ticket, but Dash Tours proprietor Dave Ash was nonetheless able to secure a block of seats for the bus-riding devotees from Saskatchewan. 

Commonwealth Stadium can now accommodate 56,400 attendees. That number does not include reporters, such as yours truly, who watch games from the comfort of the Bryan Hall Media Centre. 

That was my first stop on Sunday, game day, after the weekend’s second stop at Commonwealth Stadium. 

Three spots — numbered 15, 16 and 17 — were allocated for VISITING MEDIA. I set up shop at 17, as a tribute to legendary Roughriders receiver Joey Walters. 

On this day, at this venue, there was an even larger significance to No. 17. 

Oct. 29, 1978 — the date of Lancaster’s last game — was also Walters’ 24th birthday. 

In the first half, Walters caught one of two touchdown passes that had been thrown by Dick, whose other picturesque payoff pitch was a bomb to Rodney Parker. Both six-point receptions were made in the end zone that was closest to us. Sweet location. 

Alas, the offence ground to a halt, but the energy was building in a larger context. 

There was a clamour to see The Little General, No. 23, one final time. 

That sentiment was not exclusive to those of us who were situated in Section JJ.  

It seemed like everybody, irrespective of allegiances, wanted the iconic quarterback to enter the game. 

Even before the kickoff, some Edmonton fans had posted a banner that read: “Thank you, Ron, for all the good years.” 

Eventually, there was a chant: “We want Ronnie!” 

Obligingly, Posadowski signalled to the 40-year-old Lancaster, who removed his green warmup jacket and trundled on to what was then a natural-grass playing surface. 

The crowd exploded. Thinking of it now, nearly a half-century later, I still get goose bumps. 

En route to the huddle, Ronnie was greeted by Edmonton cornerback Larry Highbaugh. The two CFL greats, both of whom are gone now, shook hands. 

“He should have shook my hand,” Lancaster quipped years later. “With all the interceptions I threw to him, I put him in the Hall of Fame.” 

Ronnie put the Roughriders in the end zone — the one furthest away from us — to culminate his second series of the afternoon. 

Lancaster fired a touchdown pass to No. 17, Joey Walters, to tie the game at 26-26. Bob Macoritti’s convert put the visitors ahead. 

How did the “home” crowd respond? With another standing ovation for the visiting quarterback. 

“WOW!” flashed on the (black and white) video screen. 

A firetruck, which was conventionally driven around the perimeter of the playing surface after every Edmonton touchdown, did a lap to commemorate a Saskatchewan major. 

Sirens blared. 

On one side of the firetruck, there was a sign: “Hoo-ray Ronnie!” 

But his last hurrah, his last hoo-ray, wasn’t quite finished. 

When the Roughriders next possessed the football, Ronnie briskly and brilliantly drove the team 55 yards. The final yard, gained via a quarterback sneak, produced a touchdown by Lancaster. 

More sirens. More ovations.  

Even then, yet another memorable punctuation mark awaited. 

Future Hall of Fame defensive lineman Bill Baker — like Lancaster, playing in his final CFL game — sacked Edmonton quarterback Warren Moon in the far-away end zone for a safety touch that ultimately concluded the scoring as Saskatchewan won 36-26. 

Edmonton fans, bless their hearts, celebrated like their team had just won the Grey Cup. 

It was, to this day, the most perfect, poignant sporting event I have ever witnessed. 

Ron Lancaster, the king of the comebacks, brought his team back from behind one more time. 

I vividly remember how amazing it felt to get on the bus after that game, even though an overnight ride awaited us. 

There wasn’t the slightest impatience to get home. I wanted that ride back to Regina to last forever. In a sense, my wish has been fulfilled. 

What a joy it was to revisit the experience on Saturday and Sunday, and even now. 

Before the most-recent Roughriders-Edmonton game, I walked around the Commonwealth Stadium concourse. I stopped in Section JJ, behind the full-colour (!) video screen, and tried to pinpoint precisely where we would have been seated on the 29th day of October in 1978. 

I settled on Seat 23 — of course — in the second-last row. 

I sat there, sat back, and took a long look at an end zone that was about 150 yards away. 

I took a selfie, and a deep breath, and resumed a sentimental stroll around the stadium. 

Fittingly, the Roughriders finished the game with 17 points as I occupied Seat 17 in the press box. 

Edmonton countered with 13 — for Larry Highbaugh! — and, in a departure from Oct. 29, 1978, the home crowd was not even remotely inclined to revel in a Roughriders victory. 

From Seat 17, I made a bee-line for the Roughriders’ dressing room, located at the very same end of the stadium where Lancaster had worked his magic as part of a signature sign-off. 

Heading downstairs, I spied a mural that depicted an assortment of Edmonton gridiron greats. Warren Moon was shown, of course, along with various other luminaries (Jackie Parker, Tom Wilkinson, Dan Kepley, et al). 

But my eyes were instantly drawn to Lancaster, who is also regarded as football royalty in Edmonton. 

He coached Edmonton’s CFL team, you see, from 1991 to 1997. In fact, he was hired by then-GM Hugh Campbell, who had been No. 23’s favourite receiver in Saskatchewan for much of the 1960s. 

Campbell went on to coach Edmonton to the aforementioned five Grey Cup titles in succession, beginning precisely four weeks after Lancaster’s fantastic, fitting finale. 

Before Campbell began his first stint with Edmonton, he had coached at Whitworth College in Spokane. One of his players at Whitworth was Regina-born Brian O’Hara, who happened to be in the Roughriders’ lineup on Oct. 29, 1978. 

It was O’Hara, in fact, who caught Lancaster’s final pass of any description — for a 21-yard gain that set up the career-ending quarterback sneak. 

Add it all up and it seems impossibly scripted, to the point where it is too hokey, schmaltzy or far-fetched for anyone to believe. 

But it happened. I was there. Mom was there.  

We saw it. We savoured it. 

And here’s the other unfathomably fluky element of this self-indulgent tale. 

Just after I had concluded my first spasm of interviews inside the Roughriders’ dressing room, my iPhone — something else that was unimaginable in 1978 — went “DING!” 

I had received a rather substantial text message from my sister, Laura Steadman. 

She has possession of all of Mom’s slides. And, oh, how she loved to take photos! 

With another visit to Commonwealth Stadium looming, I had asked my sister if, perchance, Mom had taken and catalogued any pictures of our late-October 1978 trip to Edmonton. 

Laura, bless her heart, waded through boxes upon boxes, and then through all the slides — which rival a black-and-white video screen for sheer obsolescence. 

She eventually found a selection of priceless images, went out of her way to scan them, and then texted them to me. 

Her timing was as perfect as, well, Ron Lancaster’s final game. 

DING! There I am in one photo, wearing the same glasses that didn’t fit very well in Grade 5, at age 14. I am wearing a Roughriders shirt, a Roughriders cap, and perhaps some of the chicken that I had Hoovered the day before. 

DING! There I am in profile, still in those glasses, with the brand-new stadium in the background. 

DING! There is a shot of a sold-out stadium, which was a magnet for 42,673 people on that unforgettable day. 

DING! There is Mom on the hotel balcony, proudly displaying her Roughriders cap and, of course, the beautiful smile that I would give anything to see, one more time. 

I am getting a little misty-eyed as I write this, and remember this. However, I hasten to assert that this is not a sad story. Rather, it is a celebration of one of the happiest days of my life — following one of the best weekends of my 59-year existence. 

The latest football journey took me back to Edmonton and, by extension, nearly a decade’s worth of mother-son football trips. 

I could not have suspected at the time that I was actually conducting preliminary, yet invaluable, research for my new dream job as the team’s Senior Journalist and Roughriders Historian. 

So it occurs to me that, even as we miss her daily and dearly, Helen Vanstone is still taking me to the best places. 

Thank you, Mom, for all the good years.