It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that when the Saskatchewan Roughriders needed the biggest stop of the night in the Labour Day Classic, it was Jameer Thurman who got the job done.
With Winnipeg sitting at third and six on the Riders 35 in overtime, Thurman would perfectly read a checkdown pass to Tim White and catch the Winnipeg Blue Bombers receiver behind the line of scrimmage, giving the Green and White a 32-26 victory.
The tackle was the last of six on the night for Thurman, marking yet another impressive outing for the eight-year CFL veteran.
As well as things turned out on the final play, there was plenty of communication and planning that went into it, with Thurman doing his best to direct traffic and snuff out the drive.
“That's what comes with the job,” he said after practice on Thursday afternoon. “As a linebacker, you have to be communicating with everybody, make sure everybody's on the same page and understand what we're trying to accomplish. That's just what my job is on a consistent basis, so especially in those crucial situations, I want to make sure we're all dialed in, and we were, and then just made the play.”
It most definitely wasn’t an easy task, though, thanks to the 34,252 fans in attendance doing their level best to disrupt Zach Collaros and Winnipeg’s offence.
“Labour Day is always tough to really communicate with other guys, but we find a way,” Thurman said.
On a whole, Thurman was happy with what he saw from the defence in the Classic victory, but also felt there was plenty of room for improvement.
“We definitely took care of the run, but we have to find a way to get off the field on second and long,” he said. “And when we have them down and out, we got to make sure they stay down. I think we gave them some chances to get back in the game, and that's what forced overtime. We just got to be dialed in, executing, and finding ways to end games ourselves and not make it tougher on ourselves. “
The Roughriders have since turned their attention to the Labour Day Classic rematch on Saturday in Winnipeg, and finding a way to adjust to any changes the Bombers make is going to be paramount to Saskatchewan’s success.
“We understand who they are, what they like to accomplish, but at the same time, we got to execute ourselves,” Thurman said. “We got to do our job. Whatever they throw at us differently, we got to be prepared for, because we know they're gonna make adjustments, so are we. We just got to go out there, execute, and do our jobs.”
The Riders swept both ends of the Classic and Rematch last season, and that success acted as a springboard to their Grey Cup victory. Thurman is hoping for more of the same both this weekend and in the long run.
“Momentum building, it's important, especially going into this last part of the season,”he said. “We got to just keep improving each and every week. It's all about getting better. You can't go backwards. As long as you're getting better, leading up into the playoffs, that's all that matters.”
The Rider Broadcast Network pregame show begins at 11 a.m. on Saturday with Teagan Witko, Wes Cates and plenty of special guests. Dave Thomas and analyst Luc Mullinder will then have the game call at kickoff at 2 p.m.
