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VANCOUVER – Expect a lot of yards earned on the ground.

The Riders travel to take on the Lions in a big battle for playoff seeding in the West. Can Saskatchewan inch closer or will BC keep pace?

Fresh off the week of overtaking Andrew Harris for the league lead in rushing yards, Jerome Messam and the Saskatchewan Roughriders travel to face Harris and the BC Lions in a West Division showdown.

While the Lions have already claimed the season series with a back-to-back sweep of the Riders in Week 3 and 4, the two teams are facing off again under very different circumstances.

Despite a pair of slow starts, both teams still find themselves in the playoff hunt. While the Lions sit two games above the Riders in the race for the post-season, a loss by BC suddenly puts Saskatchewan just a game behind the Lions for third in the West.

Jonathon Jennings is back under centre for the Lions after his impressive debut fell just short of a victory. There are plenty of positives available for Jennings to take as he moves forward, including his nearly 300 yards in the air and two touchdown passes.

“I think I’m just rolling with the punches. I’m just trying to do my best every single day,” he said.

Even though Travis Lulay is close to returning to the Lions from a strained MCL tear, Jennings has been confirmed as the starter by head coach Jeff Tedford.

Last week, BC appeared to have secured an upset victory over the Eskimos, jumping out to a 23-7 lead before Edmonton stormed back by scoring 22 unanswered points to steal the victory.

“We learned some things. There’s obviously lessons that I can learn as a rookie,” said Jennings. “There’s a lot of things that I still have yet to learn and still need to focus on. Looking back at the film we saw a lot of positives.”

While Lulay is not listed on the depth chart, the Riders still took time to prepare for any scenario should he have ended up dressing for the contest.

“The coaches, with regards to their prep, obviously prep for a team like this, Travis is in some of the prep film,” said head coach Bob Dyce. “They have an idea of what Travis does and what Travis does well. If he plays, he plays. We have to face whatever 12 men they put out on the field offensively.”

Meanwhile, the Riders are coming off their most complete game of the season, running away with a 33-21 win over the Alouettes in a game that was decided by the end of the third quarter.

Speaking with reporters throughout the week, the Riders players and coaching staff were adamant that the team continues to take the season one week at a time and that the playoffs are not yet out of reach.

The team understands that they control their own destiny, a sentiment that is echoed by their opponent.

“It’s a must win for us, these next two games against Western opponents that are trying to fight for positioning in the playoffs,” said Harris. “It’s a definitely a must-win for us. We got to come to play.”

The race for the rushing title is projected to go down to the final games of the season. Those in attendance should expect an offensive showdown as the Riders and Lions give up the most overall yards.

The Lions are expecting to be tested defensively through the run, an area of the game they’ve wanted to improve on.

“We know they want to run the football. They’re leading the league in rushing right now. The last two times we played them we haven’t stopped the run as well as we wanted to,” said Adam Bighill, who leads the league in tackles. “It’s definitely a focus this week. It comes down to every man doing his job and stepping up and being aggressive. When you’re aggressive and win the line of scrimmage, good things are going to happen.”

If there’s one common goal for both teams, it’s the playoffs. Even if only one of them can make it, their aspirations and approach remain similar.

“I have no idea what it takes to get to the playoffs, it’s just what it takes this week. The focus is one day at a time, the preparation today, the preparation we have tomorrow, one week at a time,” said Tedford. “Saskatchewan just had a big win, a very convincing win last week and I know they’re going to come in here ready to go and so we have to bring our A game.”

“All I know is that as long as we win, we have a chance. That’s what we focus on – winning. We can’t control anything outside of that so we got to handle our business on the field and making sure that we get a victory,” said Dyce.

Travis Lulay rushed for a career-high 105 yards on the ground to lead the Lions to victory over the Riders in back-to-back games.
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-The Lions won the season series with Saskatchewan very early with wins in Weeks 3 and 4, both by three point margins. Both games featured head-to-head QB matchups between Travis Lulay and Kevin Glenn – since then the veteran pair of QBs have missed a combined 9 starts.

-The Lions will be looking to snap a two-game home losing streak and they are 2-3 thus far at B.C. Place this season. The last time BC lost three in a row at B.C. Place was in June-July 2004.

-With an average Time of Possession of just 24:26 over the last three games, BC’s defence has been on the field for 35:34 per game and 184 plays versus the opponents at 150 plays.

-After a three-game run without a 30+ completion, the Lions deep game has returned with three in the last two games.

-Over the last four games, Messam has rushed 51 times for 278 yards and that total has included 16 runs of 10+ yards. In the previous seven games, he averaged only 6.7 rushes per game (47 carries for 339 yards).

-Glenn has started the last two games and extended his streak to six straight with at least 200+ passing yards. Glenn led the Riders to six scoring drives last week, two for touchdowns and the other being four Paul McCallum field goals.

-The Riders will need to go at least 4-1 to remain in the playoff chase as they do not hold the tie-breaker against either BC or Winnipeg. However, they are coming off their finest performance of the season and have a game against BC this week and an opportunity to be just one win behind. They end the season against cross-over threat Montreal so chances remain for the Riders.

peeby wrote:I hope Draheim holds up. I would assume Aladenoye won't dress. If Draheim goes down once more, that means Foster goes to LT and Thorn plays centre. If Harris can't play the whole game, it'll be Shaque again, though I still feel there is a way to get Rainey into the game by shifting an import WR. But hopefully, Andrew makes it through. I had rib cartilage injuries when I still played hockey years ago and it was pretty uncomfortable. And that's beer league only.

By the by, if this is the beginning of the end for Alex Bazzie, then it'll simply be yet another case of why did it take so long..

By the by number two: Our number one pick is now on the one game injury list rather than the practice roster. Hmmm.. He notices Travis has returned, so he jogs over to congratulate him as does Bazzie and Courtenay Taylor. Somehow, the three get entangled and go down in a heap.. on top of Lulay, who just coming off the six game list, now has to go on the one game list.

You gotta wonder about all the manipulation CFL teams do. Why not just increase the rosters by four or five more guys?

TheLionKing wrote:It's sunny outside, why is the roof closed?

swervynmerv wrote:Jennings looks great today.

A missed FG by Leone and lack of red zone conversion are preventing this from being a blow out at half time!