The CFL West Division playoff race will really heat up on Friday night in Edmonton when the 9-3 Saskatchewan Roughriders head into Commonwealth Stadium to battle the 8-4 Eskimos.
This will be the first of three meetings between the two teams over the final five weeks of the regular season. They hit the field in Edmonton at 8:00pm on Friday night.
Head coach Corey Chamblin said on Wednesday that they're going to go at the Eskimos with their full game plan, despite the large number of meetings left between the two teams going forward.
“You want to win because it's going to come down to some playoff positioning here,” he said. “You see them a lot, but you have to learn how to play these guys and you've got to go for your position first and whatever it takes to win, you have to win.”
The Riders are entering the game on an up swing after picking up a 35-32 double overtime win over the Ottawa Redblacks on Sunday. Edmonton is coming off a 25-23 loss to the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, which drop them two points back of the Riders in the West Division.
The games between these two division rivals are always heated, but with playoff positioning on the line over the next five weeks, both sides are expecting things to be turned up a notch.
“I told the guys that guys are going to be playing for playoff spots in this league, so it's going to be tough,” said Chamblin. “All we have to do is keeping winning and that's all we can do. The biggest thing is just win and don't worry what others are doing.”
Kicking off the stretch run towards the playoffs on Friday night in front of a big crowd with both shades of green should make for a fun atmosphere in Edmonton.
“They're already intense no matter what time in the season they come, playing against Calgary and Edmonton, just because they're West opponents,” said defensive tackle Tearrius George. “You put it at the end of the season when you're in a tight West Conference right now, it makes it that much more intense.”
George has been stepping his game up over the past few weeks and after posting three sacks last week against Ottawa, he's quietly compiled ten on the year. He said he's not doing it alone.
“I've always said it's like a group effort,” said George. “You double one, you've got one that's freed up; you double another one and the other one comes free. It's been like that pretty much most of the season.”
The Eskimos sport a strong defensive line as well as they sit in second place on the team sack list with 39, which puts them 11 off the pace set by the Riders so far this season.
“You definitely see them on tape and they're definitely a great defensive line,” said quarterback Tino Sunseri. “Our defensive lines are similar and they do a lot of things for their defence to be distributive to quarterback. I know that's something we've concentrated on is making sure that we understand our protection packages so that we can try to limit them during the game.”
Sunseri had a big game against the Redblacks, as he led the Riders on a second half comeback with 260 yards passing, two touchdowns and no interceptions. It was a nice bounce back performance after struggling in his first professional start.
“Hopefully he can take that and become better than what we saw and become the guy that we actually think he is,” said Chamblin.
The Riders were held under 100 yards rushing in Sunday's contest, which was only the second time they've failed to hit the century mark this season – the only other coming in Week 4 against Ottawa.
While the Riders proved that they can win when throwing the ball this season, Sunseri said they can't get away from the run game, which has got them to where they are this season.
“I feel like you have to have a running game in order to win, it's huge whenever a defence has to worry about both, it's something that definitely helps an offence,” said Sunseri. “(Last week) showed that whenever we need to run, we can and whenever we need to pass, we can do that too, just to keep defences honest.”
The Riders may need that passing game down the road as they battle in the West Division playoff race. Edmonton enters the game two points back of Saskatchewan, while the Riders are just two points back of Calgary, who host BC on Saturday.
Whatever happens, don't expect the playoff picture to become any clearer after this weekend.
Thu, Apr 25, 1:30 PM
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