Arthur Ward/CFL.ca
Let’s get the obvious out of the way; 2023 has not been a great year for either the Saskatchewan Roughriders or the Calgary Stampeders.
It’s a safe bet that ten years from now the respective fanbases will not be adding too many pictures of this season in their football scrapbooks. These are two teams that have done a lot of winning over the past decade so of course expectations will be high coming into most seasons.
The point is, yes, the disappointment is understandable.
However, your perspective about your favourite team can change in a month or in this case a game. What I love about the Roughriders/Stampeders game this week is despite their records, this contest has legitimate stakes tied to it.
That’s all you can ask for this time of year and everything is on the line for two team’s looking to change their respective narratives.
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The pressure dynamic between these two squads is fascinating. Right before kickoff, the pressure is clearly on Calgary as this is a do or die game for them. A loss on Friday and the team is eliminated from the playoffs, something that hasn’t happened since 2004 when Matt Dunigan was coaching the team and Marcus Crandell was the starting quarterback.
A quick aside, how about a shoutout to John Hufnagel and the entire Calgary organization. Yes, it stinks to lose, but a massive tip of the cap to a team that hasn’t been a part of a losing season in 16 years and hasn’t missed the post-season since 2007. That is a testament to hundreds of players, coaches, scouts, trainers, and a management team that consistently replaced talent with more talent.
Back to Friday night.
So, the pressure is initially all on the Stamps, but what happens if Calgary wins? Oh, now you’ve left the door open on a proud franchise with a quarterback trying to prove he belongs as a full-time, no-questions-asked starter. Suddenly the implications for the Roughriders and their season-ending clash against the Toronto Argonauts jumps to a whole other level.
The Stampeders would have a game in hand and a season series win. It’s a difficult journey for Dave Dickenson’s squad, they would still be two points back with games against the class of the West, Winnipeg and BC, but there is a legitimate path to the playoffs.
I know that frustrated Calgary fans don’t want to hear this, but this team is better than their record. The Stampeders have lost seven games by one score; what if that record was 3-4 instead of 0-7? Between Mike Rose hitting double digits in sacks, Micah Awe topping the century mark in tackles and Reggie Begelton having his best year since 2019, there is talent on this team.
My big question for Saskatchewan is can they get to being the team we saw at the end of summer? Can they look like the team that defeated the BC Lions and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers?
In those two games quarterback Jake Dolegala threw for a combined 565 yards with three touchdowns and, more importantly, no interceptions. We’ve seen the potential in Dolegala but not the polish. Jake has been looking for a secure football home since 2019, bouncing around in the NFL for several years before making his way to Regina. Think about the stakes on the 27-year-old passer. If he can recapture his late-August form, that means a playoff berth and at the very least, it puts a real scare in either the Lions or Bombers and suddenly an up and down season is transformed into a positive springboard for the 2024 season.
If we go by what we’ve seen this year, the game itself will be a close one.
Saskatchewan won 29-26 back in Week 3 behind Jamal Morrow’s 133 yards on the ground while in Week 6 it was Jake Maier and his 315 yards, and two touchdown passes helping lead the way to a 33-31 win.
So, what do we got this time? Two desperate teams looking to climb up in the power rankings and get one step closer to punching their playoff ticket. Late wins go a long way to erasing earlier losses.
I understand if on paper this doesn’t look like the sexiest game of the week, but the ramifications of winning or losing for both organizations could not be higher. I’ll take that any week of the year.
