Stampeders hold off Roughriders to earn precious win

The Calgary Stampeders just needed to win, one way or another.

And when you need a win, you want to put the ball on Rene Paredes’ foot.

After an absolutely insane game that saw the Riders seemingly steal it on a last-minute Hail Mary, the Stampeders turned to Paredes, who hit a game-winning 50-yard field goal to seal the win.

How many of those has Paredes hit in his career? Seriously, we’re asking. The CFL doesn’t have stats for us.

That doesn’t matter, though. On Saturday night, the Stampeders (2-3) gave their season a jolt of life with an impressive 33-31 win over the Saskatchewan Roughriders (3-2) in Regina.

The victory is what matters most. A loss would have seen the Stamps lose the season series against the Riders and yes, it’s still early, but that could very well wind up mattering at the end of the season.

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But the performance matters, too. A win would have felt a little hollow if there hadn’t been improvements on the field after a couple of rough games for the Stamps.

And fortunately, there was a lot to like.

Concerns about quarterback Jake Maier should fade a little bit. He wasn’t perfect and did throw an interception, but he completed 26-of-37 passes for 315 yards and two touchdowns. He did a nice job spreading the ball among his receivers. Running back Dedrick Mills had a light night of work but still finished with a touchdown of his own.

And the Stamps’ defence, which has quietly been quite excellent all season, was very good once again. They didn’t allow the Riders to score an offensive touchdown until late in the fourth quarter and limited QB Trevor Harris to 115 yards on 16-of-22 passing. Harris, unfortunately, had to leave the game early with a knee injury.

Late in the contest, though, the Riders did cause the Stamps defence real headaches. Mason Fine was downright heroic, completing 6-of-8 passes for 122 yards and two touchdowns, including a miracle heave to Tevin Jones that somehow evaded multiple Stamps defensive backs.

If there are worries about the Stamps’ performance on Saturday night, they’ll likely focus on the special teams coverage unit.

Mario Alford’s 66-yard punt-return touchdown was the sixth big-play return, as defined by the CFL, of the season against the Stamps. His 94-yard punt-return touchdown in the third quarter was the seventh they’ve allowed.  No other team in the CFL has allowed more.

That’s going to need to be fixed, because special teams kept the Riders in the game.

It ultimately wasn’t enough, though.

The Stamps held on and earned a precious victory that breathes new life into their season.

Come playoff time in November, that’s all that anyone will care about.

QUICK HITS

Before anything else, everyone’s thoughts are obviously with Harris. He suffered what looked like an awfully painful right-leg injury in the fourth quarter. Harris is a class act and a leader and a guy who has represented the CFL as well as anybody over the last half-decade. We all just hope he recovers quickly … You can actually check some players’ stats from this season on their player pages on CFL.ca now. Not sure when that happened and it looks like they’ve gone back to the old system. It’s a small victory, but it’s something … Micah Awe had a big — and clean — sack on Harris midway through the second quarter. Somehow, the refs determined that Jonathan Moxey deserved an illegal contact penalty on the play. You can watch the play and try to figure out how that call was made … On the very next play, Mike Rose picked up a sack, so that made up for it, sort of … Marken Michel really can do stuff that few other receivers in the league can. He had an absolutely dirty spin move late in the first quarter that turned a negative play into a nice positive … It shouldn’t go unnoticed that Tommylee Lewis scored a touchdown in the second quarter of his CFL career. It takes a lot of guys a lot longer than that … Lewis also had a punt return touchdown that was called back because of an illegal block … James Vaughters’ late first half-sack of Harris was a big, big moment. Rose recovered the ball and it gave the Stamps offence the opportunity they needed to put more points on the board. A lot of people have been waiting for the defensive line to really take over, and in the second quarter it felt like they did … When you consider how Maier’s season has gone, it had to feel good for him to have two touchdown passes and 200 passing yards in the first half. Those are better stats than we’ve seen from him in entire games a couple times this season. The second half wasn’t quite as much fun … The Stamps really do need to improve on special teams coverage … Clark Barnes had a nice return of his own for the Stamps in the third quarter, taking a missed field goal back 86 yards. It’s not getting talked about nearly enough, but the rookie receiver is surpassing every expectation … Zero sacks heading into the game. Two sacks in the game. It was a nice night for Julian Howsare … The Stamps stopping Riders QB Shea Patterson on third-and-short in the third quarter was one of those little moments in the game that made you feel like maybe it really was all coming together … Honestly, what a game.

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