{"id":731886,"date":"2026-06-12T11:53:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T11:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/731886\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T11:53:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T11:53:13","slug":"saskatchewan-roughriders-running-back-begins-cfl-season-as-new-father","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/731886\/","title":{"rendered":"Saskatchewan Roughriders running back begins CFL season as new father"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"\/<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\tBy \tRylee Cohen<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGlobal News\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tPosted June 12, 2026 7:06 am\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t1 min read\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

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A.J. Oullette is entering the new CFL season with a new title: Dad.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Saskatchewan<\/a> Roughriders<\/a> running back and his partner welcomed their daughter Isla Jo this off-season.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs soon as she was born it was like the most precious thing ever, and I don\u2019t see myself as anything other than a girl dad right now, like I might have five girls.\u201d said Ouellette.<\/p>\n

Like most first-time parents, having a kid changes everything and it\u2019s no different for Ouellette. On the field, it adds drive as Ouellette<\/a> isn\u2019t just playing for himself anymore.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI\u2019m doing it for another person, right, a little extra motivation and for a while I\u2019d say probably even in college I\u2019ve always wanted a little one in my jersey in the stands and now I get to have that,\u201d said Ouellette.<\/p>\n

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Riders running back coach Andrew Harris has played with Ouellette in the past and now as a coach, he really gets to see it all, as well as the changes that have come with fatherhood.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI think the biggest thing is he\u2019s going to be mentally stronger now. You know with his wifey and the baby at home, you got to be mentally strong to deal with the lack of sleep and all the things that come along with that,\u201d said Harris.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor now it\u2019s just that work-life balance now, but for him that softer side is definitely coming out more, you know it\u2019s great to see,\u201d Harris added.<\/p>\n

With his father finesse and a little more motivation, Ouellette is looking forward to playing a season his daughter would be proud of.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Rylee Cohen Global News Posted June 12, 2026 7:06 am 1 min read Descrease article font size…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":731887,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,81332,263461,55574,24373,82],"class_list":["post-731886","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-fatherhood","tag-ouellette","tag-roughriders","tag-saskatchewan","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/731886","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=731886"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/731886\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/731887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=731886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=731886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=731886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}