Elks' Sims on costly rouge: 'Boneheaded play by me'
Published
It looked like the Edmonton Elks were going to win their first game of the season Thursday night as they led the Saskatchewan Roughriders 11-3 approaching the final minute of the fourth quarter.
Not so fast.
After struggling to generate any offence for the entire game, Trevor Harris led the Roughriders on a 78-yard touchdown drive, connecting with Mitch Picton on a short pass to cut the Edmonton lead to 11-9. Harris then escaped pressure and found Kendall Watson for a leaping catch on the two-point conversion to even things up at 11-11.
With 1:04 left on the clock, the winless Elks still had plenty of time to retake the lead. The Riders kicked off deep over returner CJ Sims’ head with the ball landing just beyond the 10-yard line and rolling into the endzone. But instead of scooping it up to prevent the go-ahead rouge, Sims jogged after the ball and took a knee, inexplicably allowing the Riders to take an 12-11 lead.
Saskatchewan later sealed the victory by picking off quarterback Taylor Cornelius at mid-field, escaping with an improbable one-point win.
Sims took ownership of his blunder after the game.
“It hurts, man. It hurts. I feel like I let the team down. It hurts,” he said. “It was a boneheaded play by me, but I’ll learn from my mistakes, and it’ll never happen again.”
“Sucks. No other way to put it. We were so close, and to end like that. Sucks,” Cornelius said.
“He knows [he made a mistake],” Elks head coach Chris Jones said of Sims’ mistake. “The moment was big and he’s a good little player. There will probably be more people talking about this than when he had a great game returning the other day.”
Benefitting from the play this time, Harris recalled a similar situation from last season where he wasn’t as fortunate.
“It was one of those only-in-the-CFL moments," said Harris, who finished with 289 yards passing to go along with one touchdown and one interception. "Last year in Montreal we lost when they missed a field goal and our returner stepped on the boundary when catching the ball. We lost when they missed a field goal, and this one was new to me.”
The victory moved the Riders to 3-1 on the season and snapped a seven-game regular season home losing streak.
On the flip side, Edmonton dropped to 0-5 as they continue hold a 19-game home losing streak. They will get the chance to snap it in Week 6 as they host the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, who sit winless on the season at 0-3.