a visit to the hometown of Roughriders President-CEO Craig Reynolds<\/a>. \u201cThey ask good questions and are respectful. Really, I haven\u2019t had a bad experience in any of the schools that I\u2019ve been in so far this off-season.<\/p>\n\u201cI don\u2019t even need to say that I hope it continues to be like that. Everybody I\u2019ve been around in this province has been awesome and I\u2019m excited to continue.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most of the excursions break new ground for Stevens, who is spending the winter in Saskatchewan with his girlfriend (Lauryn Schimke) and the couple\u2019s two dogs (Goose and Maverick).<\/p>\n
Lauryn is from Calgary, where Stevens spent his first three CFL seasons before signing with Saskatchewan as a free agent on Feb. 11, 2025.<\/p>\n
Stevens liked it here so much that: (a) He signed a two-year contract extension on Dec. 5; and, (b) He wanted to become a year-round Saskatchewanian, with Lauryn\u2019s blessing.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe got a job with an oil and gas company in Pilot Butte, so that made it a little bit easier,\u201d Stevens said. \u201cBeing able to sign a two-year extension, it was, \u2018All right, this is where our feet are going to be, so let\u2019s get settled in.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve done some travelling in the meantime, too. We\u2019ve been able to go back to Calgary and we still have a cabin an hour and a half north of Calgary. We were in Mexico in December and that was fun as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve been able to do some things and escape the cold a little bit, but we\u2019re trying to fully embrace the Saskatchewan winter. I\u2019ve heard this has been one of the better ones in recent memory.<\/p>\n
\u201cMinus-50 still hurts. Whenever that comes around, it\u2019s not very much fun and you try to stay in the house, but all in all it has been great.\u201d<\/p>\n
Especially on top of a Grey Cup win.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think (staying in Saskatchewan) was part of the original plan, anyway, but this is the best time to possibly do it,\u201d the Indianapolis-born Stevens said with a smile. \u201cIt\u2019s great to be a part of the Foundation and I try to give back in any way I can.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a similar experience when I was in grade school. A player from the Indianapolis Colts, Dominic Rhodes, came to visit our school.<\/p>\n
\u201cI also went to training camp one time and he gave me his gloves. I was a little kid, so that has stuck with me for 20-plus years. I remember thinking that I would love to have an opportunity to give back if I could.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is my opportunity and it\u2019s special. It\u2019s pretty cool to have these full-circle moments.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FOAM LAKE \u2014 The Saskatchewan Roughriders\u2019 short-yardage specialist has been a long-distance traveller during a momentous off-season. Tommy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":509897,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-509896","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cfl","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-football-league","tag-canadianfootballleague","tag-cfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509896","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=509896"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509896\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/509897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=509896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=509896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=509896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}