SPORTS TALK: Roughriders will have a more realistic chance next year
By Greg Buchanan
CFL teams don't magically immediately become Grey Cup winners simply because they hired a new head coach.
It rarely happens, although Saskatchewan Roughriders fans have seen it before. Seventeen years ago, Kent Austin, a Cup-winning quarterback with the 1989 squad, returned to Saskatchewan as a first-time head coach and led his inspired Roughriders to the third of the franchise's four CFL championships.
For a while, it looked like first-year head coach Corey Mace — a three-time Cup winner with other teams — had this season's Roughriders believing they could do it, too. They dug out of a seven-game winless skid to finish second in the West, posted a winning record (9-8-1) and won a home playoff game against the B.C. Lions.
Until the West Final, when the ill-prepared Roughriders ran into the experienced Winnipeg Blue Bombers.
Judging from his postgame comments, Mace will soon decide whether to remain as defensive co-ordinator while also handling the myriad in-game duties of a head coach.
Under first-year co-ordinator Marc Mueller, Saskatchewan's offense seemed intent on running A.J. Ouellette on every first down. This was predictable, ineffective, and an affront to unhappy, underused Ryquell Armstead, the other running back who likely made his last appearance in Saskatchewan's lineup.
Quarterback Trevor Harris, so effective during a late-season winning streak, rarely found uncovered receivers. After missing 19 games during the past two seasons because of knee injuries, Harris can't run away from pressure and openly wondered to reporters whether the Roughriders might want him next season.
Harris is 38, and his leadership qualities are well-known, but he has never won a Grey Cup as a starter. Davis Alexander, Tre Ford, or Vernon Adams Jr. are also quarterbacks worth pursuing who might better fit the Roughriders' future.
Harris, Ouellette, little-used defensive lineman Anthony Lanier II, and high-priced offensive linemen Philip Blake and Jermarcus Hardrick, who finished their seasons on the injury list, are high-priced and expendable in a salary-cap league.
Those decisions will be up to Mace and the personnel department, led by general manager Jeremy O'Day.
Considering the Roughriders deployed 16 different offensive linemen, 11 receivers, and 12 defensive linemen, the talent pipeline seems to be working. The roster will certainly undergo changes with new recruits, free-agent acquisitions, retirements, and releases, but the hierarchy will remain in place for Year Two.
Unlike Austin, who benefited immediately in 2007 from a strong roster left by ousted GM Roy Shivers, Saskatchewan's other Cup-winning coaches — Eagle Keys in 1966, John Gregory in 1989 and Corey Chamblin in 2013 — needed two or three seasons to build championship squads. This year's roster underwent a major overhaul.
It used to be difficult to put a strong team into green and white jerseys. The Roughriders rarely won. Regina was the smallest (and most ridiculed) of CFL cities, plus it had an old stadium with embarrassingly bad facilities. In pre-salary cap days, the community-owned Roughriders were on a tight budget without anyone luring high-priced players to Saskatchewan with under-the-table perks.
It's not like that anymore. Although the Riders haven't appeared in a Grey Cup since 2013, their 2007 victory started a string of four appearances in seven years.
With state-of-the-art facilities inside seven-year-old Mosaic Stadium, a league-enforced salary cap, a mostly-adoring fan base, and the promise instilled by Mace, his staff and a strong nucleus of committed players — including defensive back Rolan Milligan Jr., offensive lineman Logan Ferland and a talented group of Canadian receivers — the Roughriders will have a more realistic chance next year.