Mace says Riders are in must-win territory

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 31/08/2024 (396 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

REGINA — It’s the kind of question you hope a head coach will bite on.

Most will ignore it because they don’t ever want to make a moment bigger than it has to be. But with the way the Saskatchewan Roughriders have been trending lately, head coach Corey Mace opted to do things a bit differently on the eve of his club’s most important game of the season.

When asked if he felt Sunday’s matchup against the visiting Winnipeg Blue Bombers was a must-win game, instead of simply dismissing the question, Mace leaned into it.

“I’ll say, yeah,” Mace said during his press conference at Mosaic Stadium Saturday. “At this point, they’re kind of all like that.”

It wasn’t that long ago the Riders were riding high, winning much more often than they were losing and showing no signs of slowing down. A 19-9 victory over the Bombers back in Week 7 improved their record to 5-1, pushing them into first place in the West Division.

While the offence was holding its own without No. 1 QB Trevor Harris for a large chunk, it was Saskatchewan’s defence that was taking the league by storm, carrying a majority of the load in what proved to be several tight games. Special teams units were also pulling their weight.

It was hard not to be impressed with Mace, who doubles as the club’s defensive co-ordinator, given how unusual it is see a rookie bench boss have such success so early.

Mace was doing exactly what he was hired to do in the off-season: turn around a team that under predecessor Craig Dickenson had struggled to form a culture of accountability and hadn’t won a game after Labour Day weekend in the past two seasons.

Fast-forward to today, though, and life is much different in Riderville.

With just a tie to show for themselves over the last five games, the Riders are now a modest 5-5-1. While in most years that would see you looking up at teams in the standings, it’s been particularly tough sledding in the West this season, so much so that Saskatchewan is somehow still the best of an average bunch.

But the solid ground the Riders once stood upon has started to crumble.

A loss Sunday to the 5-6 Bombers would not only be a disappointing result for what is the first sold-out crowd at Mosaic Stadium this year — in what is considered the most anticipated game of the season for both sides — it would also mean giving up first place to their most hated rival.

Indeed, desperate times, call for desperate measures.

“We don’t have any excuse,” Mace said. “We’ve had tons of time on film, we’ve had tons of time to practise and we’ve really hashed out a lot that we identified to get better at.”

Harris didn’t add gasoline to the fire by agreeing with his coach when asked about the game being a must win, but the veteran pivot acknowledged something’s got to give.

He added what an opportunity it would be to turn things around in front of a packed house and against a rival team nipping at their heels.

“The urgency of where we’re headed and where we want to go, it has to start now,” said Harris, who returned two weeks ago from a knee injury he suffered in Week 3. “In terms of the atmosphere, we know it’s going to be juiced up.”

He added: “We’re confident who we are and who’s leading us, and I think we’re all pulling in the same direction. We’ve got a bunch of guys that care. The characteristics of our group, the core values of our group, are really solid.”

Micah Johnson is in his 11th CFL season. The veteran defensive lineman has been fortunate enough to play on some very strong teams over his career.

Most notable are the six seasons he suited up with the Calgary Stampeders, where he went to four Grey Cups, winning twice.

Johnson said every team has talented players, with the Riders being no exception.

But it’s having that belief in your locker room that you’re going to go out there and get the job done each week that separates the good teams from the great ones.

“It’s huge, man, even just on a game-to-game basis,” Johnson said. “I just really feel like football’s a game of ebbs and flows; it goes up and down throughout the game. So, in one game, you can have five high points and five low points, and it’s the team with that continuity, that can stay together in those tight moments, and know that something positive is going to come out of it. And you just keep grinding, and it usually formulates for you.

“Versus other situations, when you get down, and you see it sometimes, too, the team — it’s a word you don’t like to say —but you’ll quit. I think that makes all the difference in the world, man. You just believe that it’s going to go right. You keep fighting, and you just believe it’s going to continue at some point, it’s going to turn over for you in the game.”

Johnson said the Riders have that belief in themselves, even when times have been tough. Because the team is close-knit, he added, he’s not worried about any finger-pointing if things go from bad to worse.

That wasn’t always the case in Saskatchewan.

“That’s what we just keep telling each other, to believe, to believe in each other,” he said. “All the best teams I’ve been on were a very, very, very close-knit group, and that really matters when you know you’re out there having to fight for your brother and y’all got a personal relationship.

“When you have a personal relationship with your teammates, you can hold each other accountable, hold each other to high standards. You don’t want to let your teammate down; you know he’s trying to feed his family. It makes you watch more film. It just amps everything up that you’re trying to do.”

It’s the kind of culture Mace is proud to have helped instill, and it’s what he believes will be the catalyst to getting out of their current funk. They just have to go out and get the job done.

“No doubt it’s a very powerful thing,” Mace said. “And what I’d say is what we are finding out about this team is earlier (in the year), we definitely had it. We were winning.

“When I tell you how these guys feel, and the rest of the team feels, of how we’ve been ending these games — unfortunately, it has not turned out in our favor — and still having not only the belief, but just understanding the standard of what we know we can play like, and haven’t been able to attain it for whatever reason, that’s a silver lining for myself.

“Earlier in my career, and in my college career, I was on teams that maybe weren’t so good, and you find yourselves in these situations and the belief is almost gone. Not the case here, and I love that.”

Jeff.Hamilton@freepress.mb.ca

X: @jeffkhamilton