On a day when the Saskatchewan Roughriders clinched a CFL playoff berth at the earliest juncture in franchise history, the celebration was doused by a 48-31 loss to the Montreal Alouettes on a soggy Saturday.

Shortly before kickoff at Mosaic Stadium, the Toronto Argonauts rallied to defeat the Edmonton Elks 31-30 — an outcome that guaranteed the Roughriders’ participation in the 2025 CFL post-season.

Until Saturday, Saskatchewan had never secured a playoff spot earlier than Sept. 28.

After rolling back the precedent by 15 days, the Roughriders trailed 28-10 at halftime and couldn’t reduce the deficit to within 14 over the final 30 minutes in front of 26,951 spectators.

“I think, in the new social media day and age, it will be ‘the sky is falling,’ ” said Trevor Harris, starting quarterback of a Saskatchewan team that maintains the CFL’s best record. “We’ve lost one in a row and that’s all everybody remembers.

“The fact of the matter is, we’re 13 games in and we’re 10-and-3. We’re sitting on top of the West and we control our own destiny as far as where we end the rest of the season.

“How we respond to this is really the most important thing. It’s just like when we have winning streaks and everybody says that we’re playing so well, but we know there are things we need to improve in case we get ourselves in a situation like this game, where we can’t get behind like that.

“It’ll be no different. This team will respond. This locker room will respond. We’ll get some guys back (from injuries) after the bye week and we’ll lick our wounds and come back and be hungry for these last five games.

“It’ll be a nice, fun five-game stretch.”

Saskatchewan is still four points ahead of the second-place Calgary Stampeders (8-4), who are on a bye this week and have one game in hand. Calgary returns to action on Friday against the visiting B.C. Lions.

B.C. and Winnipeg are tied for third in the West Division at 6-7. Edmonton, which plays host to Saskatchewan on Sept. 27, is 5-8 after being outscored 17-6 in Saturday’s fourth quarter at BMO Field.

Thanks to the Elks’ loss, a Roughriders playoff berth became a certainty in Week 13 for only the third time since the CFL expanded its regular-season schedule from 16 to 18 games per team in 1986.

The Riders’ previous Week 13 clinches were in 2010 (Oct. 2) and 2019 (Sept. 28).

“Truthfully, we get all this information about the playoffs and all that stuff and nobody in that locker room cares,” Head Coach Corey Mace said. “I love that about this team.

“We’re (steamed) we didn’t do what we wanted to do today. That’s what I take from it. That’s the sign of a good football team.”

A team, remember, that is 10-3 or better at the 13-game mark for only the fourth time in franchise history — and the first time since 1970 (11-2).

“I just talked to (the players) about ‘we know what we want to be,’ but to not lose sight of the things that we’ve been able to do to this point,” Mace said.

“That room is (peeved) off. I’m (peeved) off, because we didn’t do things the way we wanted to.

“I think the timing of the bye is good for us, but I reminded those guys, ‘You’ve got to prove this every week. If you don’t come with it, you’re going to be in for a long night,’ and we were tonight.”

Facing a decimated Saskatchewan secondary that was without starting cornerbacks Marcus Sayles and Tevaughn Campbell due to injuries, McLeod Bethel-Thompson threw for 379 yards and three TDs.

Tyson Philpot caught nine passes for 238 yards and two Montreal majors. Ex-Roughrider Shea Patterson, now the Alouettes’ short-yardage quarterback, scored two TDs. Stevie Scott III added a game-high 120 yards along the ground for the visitors.

“Credit to them,” Mace said. “For certain things that we like to do, I thought schematically they had a couple of things.

“But, ultimately, we didn’t tackle for nothing tonight. I thought we had a tough time tackling. That’s kind of disappointing, because we’ve been pretty good at that.

“Defensively, it was a really tough night. I’ve got to coach these guys up better. They play hard, but I’ve got to give them better stuff to give them enough bullets to get the thing done.

“We didn’t look like us tonight.”

Yet, there were some highlights.

Harris, for example, threw his 200th career touchdown pass — a 38-yarder to KeeSean Johnson.

As well, Harris also passed the 3,000 mark in career completions, increasing the total to 3,004 before Jake Maier took over at quarterback during the fourth quarter.

Johnson, Dohnte Meyers (on a 47-yard pass from Maier), Tommy Stevens (one-yard run) and A.J. Ouellette (one-yard run) scored TDs for the Roughriders.

Ouellette, who rushed for 90 yards, is 48 shy of reaching the 1,000 milestone for the second time as a CFLer. Johnson needs 31 receiving yards to hit 1,000 for the first time.

Late in the game, with the outcome assured, Johnson was still fighting for additional yardage against a Montreal team that improved to 6-7 and snapped a five-game losing streak.

“I thought we played hard to the very end,” Mace said. “On offence, specifically, these guys were swinging until the very end.

“It didn’t matter if it was Trev in there or it was Jake in there. These guys played their tails off all the way to the end. They scrapped and fought.”

SHORT SNORTS

• The Roughriders’ Nick Wiebe had three special teams tackles to increase his team-leading total to 15.

• Brett Lauther kicked a 46-yard field goal and converted all four Saskatchewan majors. He has made seven consecutive field-goal attempts.

• The Roughriders’ Ajou Ajou had 95 yards on a career-best eight receptions.