The Saskatchewan Roughriders host the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at home for the 60th Labour Day classic in CFL action Regina SK 2025-08-31 Photo Electric Umbrella/Derek Elvin
The 60th Labour Day Classic treated fans to a fourth-quarter full of bang-bang plays and Paopao flashbacks.
The Saskatchewan Roughriders ultimately held on for Sunday’s 34-30 victory over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers before 34,243 eyewitnesses — the largest crowd to attend a CFL game at new Mosaic Stadium.
Coincidentally, and most fittingly, the only previous 34-30 victory in Roughriders history was also at the expense of Winnipeg … also on Aug. 31 … also on Labour Day weekend.
Precisely 39 years earlier, Joe Paopao had thrown a bomb to Ray Elgaard for a 56-yard touchdown with 22 seconds remaining to propel Saskatchewan to an upset victory.
Sunday’s deciding play also ended in the home team’s south end zone, to which Tevaughn Campbell sprinted after intercepting Winnipeg’s Zach Collaros on an attempt at a game-tying two-point convert.
There were two points, indeed, but in Saskatchewan’s favour as the outcome finally became a certainty — not too long after a Roughriders victory looked like a very safe bet, only to have the Bombers engineer the type of riveting rally that has typified many a Labour Day Classic.
In 1986, Saskatchewan trailed 23-7 at halftime but clawed back into the game. Yesterday, Winnipeg shrugged off a 31-17 fourth-quarter deficit thanks to back-to-back touchdown passes by Collaros.
With 30 seconds left, Collaros threw a six-yard scoring pass to Dalton Schoen, only three plays after Saskatchewan had been penalized 57 yards for pass interference.
After Schoen’s score, Campbell told himself: “Make a play, make a play … if the ball comes to you, make it.”
So it came to be … and it was 34-30, a la 1986. This is a recording.
Glen Suitor, alongside Rod Smith in the TSN booth on Sunday, was the Roughriders’ starting safety on Aug. 31, 1986. Suitor pinned the football for a Dave Ridgway convert that produced Saskatchewan’s 34th point.
The 1986 game was so long ago that the Labour Day Classic label had yet to be applied.
It was so long ago that the game wasn’t even sold out. The Paopao-Elgaard collaboration unfolded before 25,274 spectators and 2,000-some empty seats.
Trevor Harris (b. May 31, 1986) turned three months old the same day Saskatchewan won 34-30 for the first time since the franchise’s inception 76 years earlier.
Most of a lifetime later, he could only marvel at what he saw, heard, experienced and appreciated after quarterbacking the Roughriders to victory on Sunday.
“I think Rider Nation needs to know that they made an impact tonight,” Harris said. “We’re in this together and so, the next home game, let’s sell that thing out. Let’s get that thing rockin’ again and forever more.
“This is the place to play in the league. This is the place I’ve always wanted to be and where I’d love to retire, and this place is starting to rock now.
“These fans have earned it. They’ve deserved it for their steadfastness and their commitment to us. They’re part of this team, so we need them to come out each and every game the rest of the season.”
Back-to-back sellout crowds have watched the Roughriders register victories that have contributed to a CFL-best 9-2 record.
The only other two times Saskatchewan has been 9-2 — in 1967 and 1970 — the No. 1 quarterback was Ron Lancaster.
His grandson, Marc Mueller, is now in his second season as the Roughriders’ offensive co-ordinator.
That was part of the reason Harris wore a No. 23 Lancaster jersey while entering the stadium well before kickoff on the final day of August 2025.
“We always wear the retro uniforms (for the Labour Day Classic),” Harris noted. “You think back to the history of this team and (Lancaster) was the greatest quarterback to don the green and white. Him and Darian Durant are two guys who come to mind for me.
“I’m sure I’m missing a few guys, but I wore Darian’s jersey last year when he was inducted (into the SaskTel Plaza of Honour) and this year I thought it would be really, really cool to pay homage to Marc Mueller’s grandfather and to Ron Lancaster.
“You always want to make sure you’re grateful for the people who paved the path.”
People like Paopao and Elgaard, who collaborated on one of the biggest plays in the storied history of the Classic.
People like Lancaster, who played in every Labour Day weekend game at Taylor Field from 1963 to 1978.
People like George Reed, whose wife (Angie) and daughter (Georgette) were at the game on Sunday.
Images of Reed, Lancaster, Elgaard and several other green greats were shown on the SaskTel MaxTron during Sunday’s milestone matchup.
It more than lived up to the hype, even though the bar had been set at a stratospheric height.
The 60th Classic brought us the expected (an amazing game) and the unexpected (a quarterback moonlighting as a punter).
In 1983, the punter (Ken Clark) was called upon to attempt a game-winning field goal after Ridgway was injured while making a tackle on a kickoff return.
Clark, attempting his first field goal in seven years, split the uprights from 41 yards away — into the wind, to boot — to give Saskatchewan a 32-30 lead that endured for the final 43 seconds.
On Sunday, Harris unleashed his first punt as a CFLer and ended up producing a crucial rouge late in the fourth quarter.
(In the 1986 Classic, a quarterback — third-stringer Stan Gelbaugh — doubled as the Riders’ full-time punter. Parallels are everywhere.)
The first career single by Harris gave Saskatchewan an eight-point lead and forced Winnipeg to attempt a game-tying two-pointer.
The deuce became imperative after Winnipeg had reduced the Corey Mace-coached Roughriders’ lead to 32-30 — the final score of the Ken Clark game.
Clark came through in the clutch shortly after returning from Toronto and the bedside of his gravely ill mother.
“I knew that kick was going through,” Veronica Clark’s proud son told me 10 years after the 1983 Classic. “I didn’t have any doubt. It was a special day. I had dedicated that game to my mother.
“During the game, I felt that my mother was there for me for that amount of time — and gone as soon as the ball went through the uprights.”
That wonderful game, with an unrivalled human-interest angle and utterly improbable ending, will forever be on my Labour Day Classic podium.
Ditto for the 2007 Classic, which was decided when Kerry Joseph scored on a 27-yard quarterback draw with six seconds remaining in the fourth quarter. The Roughriders outlasted Winnipeg 31-26 in what turned out to be a Grey Cup preview.
The third spot on the podium? Well, that now belongs to the 60th Labour Day Classic.
“That might be the loudest game I’ve ever been a part of in this league,” Mace marvelled.
“Rider Nation, I love you. That was incredible.”
