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On a rainy Saturday night, the Saskatchewan Roughriders couldn’t overcome key injuries to their secondary as the Montreal Alouettes won 48-31.
“We know what we want to be but to not lose sight of the things we have been able to do to this point. That room is (ticked) off. I’m (ticked) off because we didn’t do things the way we wanted to do,” head coach Corey Mace said. “I think the timing for us is good for the bye but to remind those guys you have to prove this every week. I don’t care who it is. If you don’t come with it, you’re going to be in for a long night. We were tonight.”
Prior to the game, defensive backs Tevaughn Campbell and Marcus Sayles were ruled out after being deemed game-time decisions.
Kerfalla Exume, who has been a contributing special-teams player in 88 career games prior to this one, made his first start, while this was the first game Benny Sapp III dressed for in the CFL
But the veteran Montreal quarterback McLeod Bethel-Thompson saw a matchup he liked throughout the game with Exume on Als wide receiver Tyson Philpot.
Philpot finished the game with eight catches for 238 yards and a pair of touchdowns. Bethel-Thompson, who was just reactivated from the six-game injured list for this game, had 379 yards and three touchdown passes.
Mace said he doesn’t believe the personnel were the issue for them in the game.
“Our scouting department, coaches, players — we do so much to make sure that we have belief in everybody. The standard will never change; it doesn’t matter who is out there,” Mace said. “Not good enough but that’s not an excuse. If there was mental busts — which I know there was — we have to coach it better. No excuse. We have to do better than that.”
Defensive back Rolan Milligan Jr. said the explosion plays hurt them on defence.
“We talked about it earlier in the game after the first one that we have to limit the explosions or else it gets bad for us,” Milligan said. “We weren’t able to do it.”
The Alouettes were able to have success on the ground in the game against a Riders’ defence that was the best at stopping the run in the CFL. Despite losing starting running back Travis Theis early in the game, backup Stevie Scott III had 125 yards on the ground.
“We weren’t doing our job,” linebacker Jameer Thurman said. “A testament to them, they attacked us and exploited some of our run defence by at the end of the day, it was just guys not doing their job.”
Slow starts have been an issue for the Riders this season, especially so over the past seven games. The Riders have now scored just 14 points in the opening quarter during this stretch.
Saskatchewan once again fell behind early, facing a 28-10 deficit at halftime.
Saskatchewan Roughriders wide receiver Dohnte Meyers scores a touchdown for the team in a loss to the Montreal Alouettes on Sept. 13, 2025. (Saskatchewan Roughriders)
“We’re making a habit of not starting well and it has to stop. It’s not a big issue but I do think it is something we need to address in the bye week because it’s becoming a little bit too much of a habit for us,” Riders quarterback Trevor Harris said. “We have to be able to come out of the gates and be better. We should all say it starts with ourselves but I believe it starts with me. I need to be better and a little bit more crisp and stay on the field for our defence and sustain drives and drives that end in points.
“We’ve been able to dig ourselves out of holes all year but today just seemed like the hole was a little too big for us to climb out. I was proud of us for scrapping throughout the second half. There’s no quit in this team or in this locker room. There was full belief we were going to win that game. We just can’t dig ourselves in a hole early.”
Harris threw his 200th career touchdown pass in the game, connecting with KeeSean Johnson for a 38-yard touchdown. Harris finished the game with 252 yards, a touchdown and an interception.
With the game out of reach, quarterback Jake Maier came into the game and finished with 118 yards to go along with a touchdown and an interception.
Running back AJ Ouellette had 90 yards and a rushing touchdown. Short-yardage quarterback Tommy Stevens also had a rushing touchdown.
Alouettes backup quarterback Shea Patterson, who was a member of the Riders from 2023-24, had two rushing touchdowns in the game.
Riders kicker Brett Lauther made his only field goal attempt of the game and all four of his convert attempts. Montreal kicker Jose Malto Diaz made four of his six field goal attempts, one of them scoring a rouge. He also converted on all five convert attempts.
Saskatchewan clinched a playoff spot despite the loss due to both the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Edmonton Elks suffering losses earlier in the weekend.
With their final bye week of the regular season next week, the next time Saskatchewan will be in action is on Sept. 27 in Edmonton.
“I’m going to watch (this tape) in pretty good detail over the next 24 hours and figure out where I can be better,” Harris said. “I’m always going to take a hard look at myself and that will never change until I hang up my cleats, but then we will flush it and move on because that’s what you’re supposed to do — that’s what the great teams do.”
