Heading into the final three weeks of the Canadian Football League (CFL) regular season, it’s not a given the defending Grey Cup champions will be back in the playoffs to defend their title after they were defeated by the Calgary Stampeders 37-31\u00a0on Friday night.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Saskatchewan would’ve clinched a spot with a victory but now face tough road and will likely need some help to get into the postseason.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Roughriders fall behind early<\/p>\n
It was a disastrous start for the Roughriders on Friday night.<\/p>\n
After making the Stampeders punt on their first possession, Quali Conley filling in for the injured James Letcher Jr at the returner spot, dropped the punt which was recovered by the Stamps, who\u00a0capitalized as Stamps quarterback Vernon Adams Jr found Clark Barnes for a 15-yard touchdown to give Calgary the lead.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The green and white did respond on their first drive of the game, ending off with a 23-yard touchdown grab from Kian Schaffer-Baker to tie the game.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Calgary would quickly regain the lead with a big play as Adams Jr found Damien Alford for a 48-yard touchdown catch as the Stampeders moved back ahead.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dawson Hodge added a 38-yard field goal for Saskatchewan to move them within four.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rene Parades provided the only scoring in the second quarter with a field goal, but the Roughriders had opportunities to add points to the board as Hodge missed a pair of field goals (51,45), as the Stampeders led by a touchdown following the first half.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Calgary pulls away<\/p>\n
Hodge opened the scoring in the second half with a 44-yard field goal, but that was matched by Parades who booted a 45-yard field goal, leaving the Roughriders down by seven points heading into the final quarter.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Stampeders would go on to chew up the clock, with a drive that last nearly eight minutes, it was finished off with a touchdown catch by former Roughrider Tevin Jones.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A costly interception set up Calgary with excellent field position as Jalen Philpot finished off the short drive with a touchdown catch, giving Calgary a 34-13 lead with just under five minutes left.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Saskatchewan attempted to make a comeback, answering with a 13-yard touchdown catch from Daniel Wiebe.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Stampeders added a field goal to restore a three-possession advantage. Roughriders quarterback engineered a pair of touchdown drives to end the game with Dhel Duncan-Busby and Jaylen Johnson each scoring a touchdown, but it was not enough as the Roughriders fell 37-31 to the Stampeders.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Harris finished the game with 453 passing yards and four touchdowns. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Adams Jr also had four touchdowns of his own with 242 passing yards.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Schaffer-Baker had nine catches for 120 yards receiving for Saskatchewan.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Playoff race tightens<\/p>\n
With the loss, Saskatchewan also lost the tiebreaker to Calgary due point differential in the two contests between the two teams.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Roughriders now lost the tiebreaker to three of their divisional opponents who they’re battling for a playoff spot as the BC Lions and Winnipeg Blue Bombers also hold the advantage.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Saskatchewan did get some help from the Montreal Alouettes who defeated the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Saturday as they clinched first place in the East Division.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Roughriders will now meet the Alouettes in back-to-back games beginning on Thanksgiving Monday in Montreal.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Entering this week, Saskatchewan and Calgary are tied for third with 16 points, although the Roughriders have played one less game. Winnipeg trails by two points. \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Heading into the final three weeks of the Canadian Football League (CFL) regular season, it’s not a given…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":921758,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[437],"tags":[49,48,521,522,520,82],"class_list":["post-921757","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\/921757","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=921757"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/921757\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/921758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=921757"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=921757"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=921757"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}