Sunday Morning 'Rider Blogging

The good news from Friday night's loss to B.C. is that the 'Riders' greatest weakness for most of the season turned into a massive strength. While the Lions missed two field goals and, Saskatchewan's special teams were solid across the board, with Luca Congi nailing two long field goals, Jamie Boreham punting effectively, Jason Armstead posting only one return that might be worth questioning (that in returning a missed field goal to the 13 rather than conceding a single) and the cover teams limiting the Lions' returns all night.

But unfortunately, there isn't much else positive to be said about the game, particularly for such a close contest. And while most of the attention seems to have focused on the offence's ineffectiveness until its last drive, the more worrisome angle to me looks to be the defence's difficulty in controlling the Lion offence.

Particularly after Ricky Ray's first-half demolition of the defence two weeks ago, one would expect the 'Riders to have schemed to control a precision passing game. But for the bulk of the game, Buck Pierce was allowed to do a fairly effective imitation of Ray - getting to the one-yard line mostly with a passing attack on the first two drives, and into field goal range on the next three before the Lions punted for the first time on their last drive of the first half. The most charitable explanation I can see is that the 'Riders' game plan was focused on trying to rattle Pierce even at the expense of giving up significant yardage - but even assuming that the team was following a strategy that odd, one would think that the first half-dozen times where Pierce took big hits as an acceptable price for making a play would have hinted that the plan wasn't working.

The defence was somewhat more effective through most of the second half. But it then showed its weakness again when Saskatchewan could least afford it, allowing the Lions to get into field-goal range on their final drive with little resistance.

Fortunately, the defensive issues were masked by the Lions' difficulty converting on their drives. On two drives, the defensive line managed to stuff runs from the 'Riders' one-yard line, and of course it deserves praise for that. But when it comes to Whyte's missed field goals, the defence can't take any particular credit for the low point total. Which means that the Lions would have had eight additional points just by successfully kicking makeable field goals, or sixteen if they'd managed the basic tasks of making their field goals and converting on touchdown opportunities from the one-yard line.

All of which is to say that the close score ultimately flattered a 'Rider team which was mostly outplayed on both sides of the ball. And while the upcoming game against the Argonauts may make for an ideal opportunity to get back on the winning side of the ledger, the 'Riders are running out of time to develop some consistency in dealing with their division rivals.