Grey Cup primer: Can Montreal stop Saskatchewan?

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The Saskatchewan Roughriders face the Montreal Alouettes for the Canadian Football League championship on Sunday at 6 p.m. ET in Winnipeg. Here's a primer on the 112th Grey Cup game:

Saskatchewan is favoured to end its Grey Cup drought.

The Roughriders haven't won a championship since 2013, which is also the last time they played for the Grey Cup. Twelve years may not sound like much, but that's a pretty long dry spell in a nine-team league. The B.C. Lions are the only other club that hasn't played in the title game since the Riders' last appearance.

In the meantime, things were a little, well, rough for the Riders. They had an overall regular-season record of 83-92 and just three playoff wins in the 10 seasons from 2014-2024 (2020 was cancelled due to Covid).

This year, though, Saskatchewan has been the CFL's top team from the get-go. They raced out to a 4-0 start and ran their record to 8-1 before finishing a league-best 12-6 following two meaningless losses to close the regular season after they'd clinched the West Division title.

After enjoying a first-round playoff bye, Saskatchewan rallied to beat visiting B.C. 24-21 in a thrilling West final last Saturday. Trailing 21-17 with just 63 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter, quarterback Trevor Harris drove the Riders 74 yards in seven plays for the game-winning touchdown on a three-yard pass to Canadian receiver Tommy Nield with 11 seconds left.

Now it's up to Harris and company to deliver a rare (and much-deserved) championship to the passionate, watermelon-hatted fans of Saskatchewan. Their team has won