How do you spell relief? W-I-N!
The Saskatchewan Roughriders kicked their five-game losing streak to the curb with a convincing 52-0 rout of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in Labour Day Classic XLIX Sunday afternoon before a sellout crowd of 33,427.
What changed? The Riders will tell you nothing. The football gods just seemed to smile on them for the first time in a long time. The evidence was a Sandro Deangilis 50-yard field goal which capped the Riders' opening drive. It hit the right upright and fell through the posts for an early 3-0 lead. Who would have thought that's all the offence they would need for the day?
But as far as game prep goes, nothing really changed. Coach Corey Chamblin pointed out after the game the additions of middle linebacker Joe Lobendahn and cornerback Milt Collins had a positive effect but overall it was just Saskatchewan's day.
"I'll tell you what, I told the guys this is the biggest win of my career," Chamblin revealed after the game. "Even bigger than the first one. It seemed like everything went right. After five weeks when everything goes wrong, thank God things went right today."
Through the losing stretch Chamblin calmly advised his team and Rider fans that if they continue to work to their fullest each practice and in games, things will turn around. Boy did they ever.
"We didn't change one thing," said Rider tailback Kory Sheets, who had his first 100 yard rushing game as a Rider. "Actually no, we changed one thing. We finished."
They sure did, scoring 20 points off of a ton of Blue Bomber turnovers. And the victory was even sweeter for the many former Blue Bombers who now wear green and white.
"It feels great," smiled Rider lineman Brendon Labatte who spent the past four years with Winnipeg. "This is the first Labour Day I've ever won and what do they say? If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. It was just a great all-around team effort today. This is the Rider team you can expect the rest of the way. We're a good squad with a lot of talent and if we keep playing this hard we'll be alright.
It was the largest margin of victory for the Riders in the Classic's history and the first shutout since the very first Labour Day Classic in 1949, also a Rider win. But it came with a price. Rider quarterback Darian Durant left the game with a neck injury and he wouldn't commit to playing in next Sunday's Banjo Bowl.
However Chamblin reported the injury wasn't serious and that had the game been closer, Durant would have come back in.
Of course nothing's ever easy around here and the skeptics say it was a hollow victory, over a last-place Winnipeg team which left Regina at 2-7 while the Riders went to 4-5. It doesn't matter! After the gloom and doom we've gone through the past six weeks, it's time to smile again. They earned it.
"It was just one of those days," Chamblin concluded. "We kept working hard and I believed things would turn around. Now I hope it continues."
