Roughriders’ yearlong struggles continue
Loss to Argos leaves them 0-7
TORONTO — Say bye.
The Saskatchewan Roughriders have scattered to various centres across North America, unhappy in the knowledge they’re going into their bye week with a CFL-worst 0-7 record.
The Roughriders remained 0-for-2015 thanks to a 30-26 loss to the Toronto Argonauts on Saturday at Rogers Centre.
It’s only the third time in franchise history that Saskatchewan has opened a regular season with seven straight losses. The other instances were 1959 and 1979.
This time, instead of getting back to work right away and trying to fix things, the Roughriders have to take a week off.
“We’ll be back at it regardless,” guard Chris Best said. “I’m sure everyone will be thinking about it all week.
“It won’t be much of a relaxing bye week, for sure. But it shouldn’t be. We’ve got to be ready.”
The Roughriders don’t play again until Aug. 22, when the Calgary Stampeders visit Mosaic Stadium. Saskatchewan likely won’t resume practising until Aug. 18.
Asked how much he’ll stew over things during the week off, Best replied: “I don’t know. I’ll let you know next week.”
“We’ve got to self-evaluate,” he added. “We’ve got to figure out what we’re doing wrong — penalties, bad plays, bad technique.
“We’re finding every way to lose a game so far. We’ve got to find a way to win.”
There have been recurring breakdowns throughout the Roughriders’ first seven games, but the ones that stood out again Saturday were an inability to force turnovers (they still have just two take-aways all season) and a penchant for taking penalties.
The Roughriders, who entered the week as the league’s most-penalized team, were flagged a team-record 24 times for 192 yards in the contest. They had more penalties than first downs (23).
“We had a lot of good play and we squandered it away with penalties,” slotback Chris Getzlaf said. “If those aren’t happening, this is a completely different game.”
First-half penalties wiped out three Saskatchewan touchdowns (55- and 18-yard passes from Brett Smith to Getzlaf and Geoff Tisdale’s 44-yard interception return) as well as a 35-yard field goal by Paul McCallum.
Head coach Corey Chamblin said during the week that he thought the Roughriders had learned their lessons when it came to limiting negative plays like penalties. That wasn’t evident Saturday.
“Anytime you plug new guys (into the lineup), you hope that guys can learn from one another,” Chamblin said. “But it’s going to happen; in football, there are going to be penalties.
“You just can’t have (24) of them and you definitely don’t want to take them during those points of time when you’re taking points off the board.”
Despite losing 24 potential points in the first half, the Roughriders still led 13-8 at the break thanks to some fine play.
Smith’s first career CFL touchdown pass, a six-yarder to Getzlaf, was set up by Nic Demski’s 93-yard return of a missed field goal. And a 27-yard field goal by McCallum on the last play of the first half came after Smith engineered a 57-yard drive in 24 seconds.
The Roughriders stretched the lead to 16-8 on a McCallum field goal early in the third quarter, but the Argos closed the gap when Akwasi Owusu-Ansah intercepted a Smith pass and returned it 50 yards for a touchdown.
After quarterback Trevor Harris threw to offensive lineman Wayne Smith for the two-point convert, the score was tied — and a seesaw battle ensued.
Brett Smith, who was making just his second career start, threw a 55-yard TD pass to Getzlaf to put the Roughriders up by a touchdown, but the Argos replied with scoring tosses from Harris to Vidal Hazelton (27 yards) and Diontae Spencer (52 yards).
A McCallum field goal made it 30-26, setting the stage for a wild final minute. Smith drove Saskatchewan to the Toronto 15-yard line, but throws into the end zone on consecutive plays fell incomplete and time ran out.
McCallum kicked four field goals and two converts for the Roughriders. Ronnie Pfeffer hoofed two field goals and two converts for the 4-2 Argos, who also recorded a safety.