Game 4: Blue Bombers (3-0) at Stampeders (2-1)

Kickoff: Thursday, July 3rd, 8 p.m. CDT; McMahon Stadium, Calgary
TV/Streaming: TSN, CBS SportsNetwork; CFL+
Radio: 680 CJOB (pre-game begins at 6 p.m. CDT); Play-by-play: Derek Taylor/analyst: Doug Brown; Sirius XM (ch. 167)

Scene Setter

It was this week a year ago — 369 days, to be exact — that the Winnipeg Blue Bombers travelled into Calgary and then tumbled into a deep, dark hole with their fourth consecutive loss to open the 2024 Canadian Football League season.

They had dropped a sloppy 22-19 decision to the Stamps in overtime and, in the process, had also lost star quarterback Zach Collaros with what was later referred to as a ‘chest contusion.’ And seemingly overnight the narrative across the land fixated on how a team which had appeared in four consecutive Grey Cups now looked tired and old.

In that moment, as the old saying goes, ‘they had one foot on the gravel and one foot in the grave.’

Of course, we all know how the rest of the story unfolded. That 0-4 start became 2-6 and then the club won 10 of its last 11 before falling to the Toronto Argonauts in last year’s Grey Cup.

The point here — and yes, we do have one — is to compare that putrid start from this time last season to where the 2025 Blue Bombers find themselves now as they prepare again to meet the Stampeders in Calgary. They are a perfect 3-0 and, yes, with some rough edges that need smoothing, but clearly again among the CFL’s elite.

The deep, uber-analytical take here? Losing sucks. It can be mentally draining and physically taxing.

Winning, well, it is absolutely glorious.

“I’ve kind of tried to blank out the first half of last year, to be honest,” said veteran guard Pat Neufeld when asked to bite into the compare-and-contrast analogy to this time a year ago. “I would say we weren’t connected as a team back then. We were just all over the place and weren’t making those little plays that in years prior got us through those tight games.

“There were some days that were brutal where we had to go over things. There was just this general feeling that we were not the team we envisioned we were going to be, and it just wears on you mentally. There’s a stress of being a professional football player. And if you’re a good pro you’re putting pressure on yourself every single day because everything is on tape and your job is on the line every time. We all understand that.

“This season we’re playing more cohesively and it’s a lot more complimentary where we’re connected to each other. If there’s a lull, then it’s the other group coming onto the field that helps picks up the other. It’s getting us back to where we want to be. We just re-established a baseline in training camp. Despite the amount of turnover we’ve had, there’s still a good core of veteran guys here. Even those guys who are in their second and third year here now understand that standard and we’re trying to maintain it in practice and in meetings.

“We just feel now that we’re a better team in a better spot,” Neufeld added. “We still have that high pressure, but it’s not in a negative way. It’s not dreading things or, ‘I can’t believe we did this’ or ‘I can’t believe that happened.’ Now, it’s ‘Yeah, it happened. How do we overcome it?’ It’s just a lot more uplifting.

“It’s just a positive atmosphere again, just as it was at the end of last season. We practice hard and we put in a ton of time in meetings. Ultimately, winning is not only fun, it fixes a lot of things.”

The Blue Bombers meet a revamped Calgary squad Thursday night featuring veteran Vernon Adams, Jr. at quarterback and a revamped and stingy defence in the inaugural Stampede Bowl. This is the first time the Stamps will be facing a team from the West, but the fourth of five consecutive games against their division for the Blue Bombers, who have a bye next week before hosting Calgary on Friday, July 18th.

Winnipeg has already won the season series with the B.C. Lions and is up one on the Edmonton Elks after last week’s victory. This home and home with the Stamps is then followed by a doubleheader with the Argos before another trip to Calgary on August 9th.

“Right now we’re trying to get up on these opportunities and get up on these West teams,” said defensive end Willie Jefferson. “But we’re not dwelling on last year. New year. New opportunities. New mindset.

“Remember at the beginning of last year those games we lost were close (after a 15-point loss to Montreal the next three defeats were by a total of nine points). It was the little things that were killing us like ball security, finishing drives, getting off the field on defence, communication.

“We wanted to start fast and implement that physicality, that grit and that tough mindset to everybody on this team. We’re just trying to ride that wave right now.”

That wave began in training camp with a renewed focus. That carried into the preseason where while the results don’t count, the attention to detail does. And it carried over into the start of Winnipeg’s season.

“We’re locked in,” said veteran receiver Nic Demski. “That was one of the messages coming into training camp — we wanted to be locked in right from the beginning. The vets took that to heart — we took that as a call out, in a way — and we’ve been making sure everyone in this building, top-down, is on the same page and doing absolutely everything it takes to win.

“We’ve got a lot of good leaders here, but it makes it easier to lead when you’ve got guys who have bought in, want to be here and want to do the right thing.”

THE LINEUP: The Blue Bombers depth chart features two changes for this week in Calgary, bringing aboard RB Brady Oliveira and guard Micah Vanterpool while RB Quinton Cooley and LB Fabian Weitz are moved to the practice roster.

That means the club will return to the offensive set-up it had in the opener before Oliveira went down in the first drive, with three Americans along the offensive line in Vanterpool and tackles Stanley Bryant and Kendall Randolph.

The one-game injured list features KR/RB Peyton Logan, LS Mike Benson, LB Jonathan Jones, WR Dillon Mitchell and DT Tanner Schmekel while DT Jamal Woods, DBs Jake Kelly and Enock Makonzo and OL Eric Lofton are all on the six-game injured list.

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