It’s my Parting Shot for my Monday Musings…..
All the warnings late last week of beware the trap and the RedBlacks are better than oh-and-7 had some validity back on Friday in Regina – until the start of the fourth quarter! In the final 15 minutes, the Saskatchewan Roughriders took over and over-whelmed Ottawa by a 42-20 final score. Coupled with Edmonton’s Saturday loss to Montreal and the Green and White are, technically, the first place team in the C-F-L West!
Actually, the Riders were fortunate to be playing the woeful RedBlacks on Friday as they were able to get away without having several key starters – most notably receivers Samuel Emilus and Kian Schaffer-Baker, running back A-J Ouellette plus defensive back Rolan Milligan Junior. The replacements at running back and receiver did admirably, but the Saskatchewan secondary is suspect without Milligan. Jake Maier was able to complete several passes over the middle while rarely being pressured by the Roughriders’ front four. To say that Malik Carney, Micah Johnson and Habbakuk Baldonado are sorely missed from the defensive line rotation is a massive understatement. It forces the Green and White to play almost exclusively zone defence, from which there seems to be a lot of breakdowns in coverage! We’ll see how the replacements fare this Saturday on the road against a slightly better Eastern opponent than Ottawa in Hamilton!!
It was gratifying to see Canada’s Under-18 men’s hockey team wallop the Excited States in the Hlinka-Gretzky Cup final on Saturday! Following the Olympic women’s and men’s losses and recent World Junior failures, and while I try very hard to keep from mixing sports with politics, I can’t help but want to tell the lying, cheating cheeto-haired U-S President where to stick his tariffs!
With W-H-L training camps approaching rapidly – roughly two-and-a-half weeks away – if you’re a Regina Pats’ fan, you’re pretty excited about the next two seasons with Maddox Schultz and Liam Pue in the line-up following their productive offensive performances on behalf of Canada at the Hlinka-Gretzky event. Also, if you’re one of those Saskatoon Blades’ fans that gets all bent out of shape when a local product doesn’t find their way onto the Bridge City Bunch roster and turns out to be a pretty darn good player – like Kaden Stroeder was for Canada and suits up in the Dub for the Edmonton Oil Kings – remember the Lanigan native Stroeder was taken fifth overall by Edmonton in the 2024 W-H-L Prospects Draft while the Blue and Gold didn’t have a pick until 61st overall because they were busy trying to win a championship that spring with Sidorov, Wong, Minten, etcetera! Think and do some research before you complain!!
That’s my Parting Shot. I’m Les Lazaruk…and it turned out nice again!
