Tuesday marked the first day the Saskatchewan Roughriders returned to practice after their 51-6 loss to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers on Saturday.
“We didn’t spend a lot of time with the team watching it. We asked the players to watch it on their own, study it, learn from it, and then move on. At the end of the day, you have to flush it,” said head coach Craig Dickenson. “It’s a loss whether you lose by 50 or lose by one, it still counts the same.”
“We came out here today with a lot of focus. I feel like we executed really well and just have to take it one day at a time, one play at a time. [The loss is] nothing new to us [as a team],” said quarterback, Jake Dolegala.
The Riders know they will have to step it up this weekend after failing to get even a touchdown in last week’s matchup.
“That’s our only option [to bounce back]. We’re definitely not settling with the performance we had and we’re going to come out and continue to do our best every single day. So we can come out and give our home crowd a great show [this week],” said receiver, Kian Schaffer-Baker.
“We’re totally moved on. Edmonton’s just the only thing on our minds right now,” said Dolegala.
Edmonton has fallen to Saskatchewan twice this season. However, the team will look different for their third and final matchup of the regular season. Tre Ford has now taken over and despite starting the season 0-9, the team has now gone 3-1 in their last four games.
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The Elks are slowly crawling up the standings in the west which makes a win on Friday for the Riders, who sit 6-6 on the year, that much more important.
“A win against them, especially being a divisional opponent puts us a little bit closer to BC, potentially makes some more space between us and Calgary and, you know, a lot more space between us and Edmonton. So it means a lot as far as the standings go,” said offensive lineman, Evan Johnson.
“It feels like we had to reintroduce ourselves to Edmonton [this week]. That’s a lot of film that’s gone by since we last played them. But, you know, that’s still the same core group of guys, still the same group of staff. But they’re definitely playing better. They [our team] know how big this game is in the standings. It means a lot for us if we can beat them and that’s where our focus is this week,” shared Dickenson.
A couple of notable players not at practice on Tuesday were defensive back Deontai Williams who was out with a hamstring injury and Anthony Lanier, who did not practice for a non-injury related reason.
