Canadian football followers now wimps towards weather

The weather doesn’t scare these Roughriders fans.

    It seems like the venerable Saskatoon Hilltops are the only ones left in Canadian football who are “prairie tough.”

    The 19 time champions of the Canadian Junior Football League seem to relish and enjoy situations when the weather gets a little adverse. Last week when it snowed at Ron Atchison Field and was -2 C, the Hilltops players had their fun moments acting like children with the elements amongst the seriousness of practice.

    The fun included star running back Logan Fischer stamping out “Hillies” in the snow.

    The linemen hit the field wearing short sleeve shirts and shorts.

    As time marches on, it seems like the Hilltops are the exception to the norm.

Fans come prepared for the cold for Saturday’s Roughriders game.

    On the CFL front this week, you could hear the sounds of a large vocal group complaining they didn’t want to go to the games, when the weather gets a little adverse.

    During Saturday’s game at Mosaic Stadium in Regina between the visiting Edmonton Eskimos and the host Saskatchewan Roughriders, the temperature was around -5 C and there was a light dusting of snow. For November, this is a heat wave moment to see any football game in Canada.

    The crews at Mosaic Stadium deserve huge applause for clearing the field from a decent overnight snowfall.

    Still, I encountered a large number of fans, friends in the media and some football players that were complaining like an old school Winnipeg, Man., type blizzard hit Regina leaving behind four-feet of snow with temperatures dropping to -30 C. All of a sudden, it was like let’s ensure all our football games get played inside of domed stadiums.

Quarterback Mike Reilly (#13) had a big game for the Eskimos.

    The Roughriders listed the paid attendance for Saturday’s game at 31,627, but it seemed like there were 10,000 no shows. The visiting Eskimos won 28-13, and the game was fairly good for the last regular season outing by both sides.

    The visitors held a 14-13 edge heading into the fourth quarter. Edmonton scored two touchdowns in the first six minutes of the fourth quarter to go up 28-13, and Saskatchewan started to gear down to ensure any unnecessary injuries were prevented before going into playoffs.

    Eskimos quarterback Mike Reilly exemplified old school tough completing 21-of-27 passes for 294 yards, and he scored three short-yardage majors along the ground.

    Both sides had a lot of players make good plays in the minor obstacle that was the weather on that day.

    While the estimated crowd of 21,000 that came out were engaged in the game and gave the stadium a great atmosphere, you still noticed the empty seats.

Eskimos RB CJ Gable tears downfield on a pass reception.

    Then you started wondering when did a larger chuck of society become wimps as far as the weather was concerned?

    Do we only go to outdoor football games when it is sunny, clear and around 23 C, so we can wear t-shirts, shorts, nice sun dresses and sip on fancy cool drinks?

    Do we all have a “silver spoon” complex now?

    As legendary Pittsburgh Steelers and Pro Football Hall of Fame quarterback Terry Bradshaw might say, “Come on folks. This is football!”

    Football is an outdoor game. It is made to be played in all sorts of weather conditions. Plus, the leagues in Canada are playing in Canada, so bad weather will be a reality.

    The weather can be perfect. The weather can also plague games with rain, wind and snow. When games are played on natural grass surfaces, the best part is getting to play in the muck and mud.

    The elements are part of the game and how the athletes deal with them adds to the story of the game.

Eskimos DL John Chick (#97) battles Roughriders OL Bruce Campbell.

    It seems like everyone is so plugged into the laptop computers and mobile phones that no one wants to go outside anymore.

    In all reality, the weather conditions in Regina on Saturday weren’t that bad.

    Now we go to Calgary on Friday, where the Stampeders hosted the Winnipeg Blue Bombers at McMahon Stadium for the final regular season clash for both sides. The contest was played at night and the temperature was around -13 C with some snow.

    The Bombers won 23-5 and the Stampeders announced the paid attendance as 24,281. When you watched the game on television, it seemed like about 10 spectators were in each section of McMahon Stadium and the two teams were playing inside basically an empty facility.

    Back in November of 2008, the Stampeders won a cold weather West Division final 22-18 over the British Columbia Lions before a soldout crowd, where almost all the ticket buyers showed up.

Bad Weather doesn’t phase players like Hilltops LB Cameron Schnitzler.

    In the West Final in November of 2010, the Roughriders came into McMahon Stadium and knocked off the host Stampeders 20-16 before a packed house in a cold weather game.

    Hamilton played host to a classic snowy Grey Cup in 1996, when the Toronto Argonauts knocked off the Edmonton Eskimos 43-37.

    There still has to be room in our game for the Cal Murphy led Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the 1980s or the Ron Lancaster, George Reed and Ron Atchison era Saskatchewan Roughriders from the 1960s that excelled in the bad weather conditions.
    Don’t you miss the shirtless guy that showed up at Bombers home playoff games at old Winnipeg Stadium when it was -20 C before windchill?

    To be honest, most football games in Canada are played in pretty close to ideal conditions, which makes the adverse weather games stand out and stick in the collective memory of all that saw them.

    Still, the fact people stayed home when conditions were slightly adverse looked weak. Here is hoping all of us in Canada can be just a little stronger when it comes to going to football games when conditions are slightly less than ideal.

Rams season ends in playoff loss to Thunderbirds

Quarterback Noah Picton (#4) and the Rams fell in the playoffs to UBC.

    The University of Regina Rams playoff comeback came up short causing their 2017 U Sports campaign to come to an end.

    On Saturday in Vancouver, B.C., the Rams trailed the host University of British Columbia Thunderbirds 23-2 early in the second quarter and 28-7 early in the third quarter. At that point, the Rams scored a pair of touchdowns to cut the Thunderbirds lead to 28-21 with 9:43 to play in the fourth quarter, but that score ultimately held up as the final outcome in the Canada West semifinal clash between the two sides.

    Rams quarterback Noah Picton had an off game completing 13-of-32 passes for 162 yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions. Running back Atlee Simon had a huge day for the Rams carrying the ball 26 times for 222 yards and scoring one touchdown.

    Thunderbirds quarterback Michael O’Connor completed 17-of-30 passes for 259 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions.

Atlee Simon ran for 222 yards in the Rams playoff loss.

    Between the regular season and playoffs, the Rams finish with a 4-5 mark. 

    Last year, the Rams season came to an end, when they fell 40-34 in Canada West semifinal to the Thunderbirds in the final U Sports game ever played at Regina’s Taylor Field.

    The Thunderbirds improve to 7-2 including games in the regular season and playoffs. 

    They will travel to Calgary this coming Saturday and meet the U of Calgary Dinos, who have an 8-1 mark between the regular season and playoffs, in the Canada West championship game - the Hardy Cup – for the third straight year.

    The Dinos and Thunderbirds, who are guided by one of the all-time great head coaches in the history of U Sports in Blake Nill, are the recognized powerhouses of the Canada West Conference and were pegged to meet again in the Canada West final.

    Nill will be coaching in this contest for the 10^th straight year. He was the Dinos head coach for the first seven Canada West final appearances of that stretch.

Blades win thriller in Edmonton, other notes

Cameron Hebig netting the winning goal for the Blades on Saturday.

  The Saskatoon Blades won a thriller on Saturday night in Edmonton.

    Locked in a 2-2 draw with the host Oil Kings, Blades overage star centre Cameron Hebig blasted home the winning goal with 9.8 second to play to give the visitors a 3-2 victory before 11,172 spectators at Rogers Place. The Blades have won four of their last five games improving to 7-8-1. The Oil Kings fell to 5-10-2.

    Libor Hajek and Josh Paterson both had singles for the Blades. Trey Fix-Wolansky and Tomas Soustal replied with singles for the Oil Kings.

    Ryan Kubic turned away 29 shots to pick up the win in goal for the Blades. Boston Bilous stopped 25 shots taking the setback in goal for the Oil Kings.

    The Blades return to action on Friday, when they host the Swift Current Broncos at 7 p.m. at the SaskTel Centre.

• While driving back to Saskatoon after Saturday’s Roughriders game in Regina, I miss the live late night radio hosts that pass on news updates, who have been purged over the years due to media cuts. Programs that air on late night radio are usually pre-recorded. I was wondering what the score was in the Canada West semifinal playoff game involving the Rams and what the scores were in the WHL and the SJHL. In the old days, someone would list them on late night radio and casual followers had an idea of who won or lost. There were no mention of any of those scores on Saturday night. I was thinking about checking my mobile phone during a rest stop in Davidson. I wondered how many casual fans actually checked their mobile phones for those types of scores.
• Former Roughriders defensive lineman John Chick appears to be ageless. Playing for the Eskimos in their win over the Roughriders on Saturday, Chick had a sack and four tackles and caused all sorts of problems for the Roughriders offensive line. At age 34, Chick had five sacks and 30 tackles in 16 regular season games split between the Eskimos and Hamilton Tiger-Cats this season.
• Team Saskatchewan fell 2-1 in overtime to Team British Columbia in the bronze medal game of the National Women’s Under-18 Championship on Sunday in Quebec City, Quebec. Saskatchewan had a 2-1 record in round robin play and fell 6-2 to Ontario Blue in a semifinal on Saturday. Ontario Red downed Ontario Blue 3-1 in Sunday’s gold medal game.

    If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.

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