CFL 'Quick KIcks' 2025: Week 3

By Chris Lawton

Welcome to week three of our weekly review of each week of the 2025 CFL season. ‘Quick Kicks’ brings you week to week news of how the games went, scores, surprises, and a general feel of ‘what we learned’ from the games.

Let’s dive right in. The first game of the weekend saw the Montreal Alouettes visit the Edmonton Elks for Thursday night football. Almost inevitably given how they have started the season, the Alouettes came away with a 38-28 win and became the first East Division team to record a win against the West this year.

With that win Montreal now moves to 3-0 this year and 9-0 in June games over the past three seasons. Whilst starting quarterback Davis Alexander, who went 20 of 24 for 254 yards with 3 touchdowns in this one, has now begun his career at 7-0 as a starter. That matches him with Bo Levi Mitchell and Jeff Garcia for the second most successful career starts ever in the CFL and one game away from tying Danny McManus who holds the record having started his CFL career with eight straight wins. With that in mind Als fans can be forgiven for wincing when Alexander pulled up holding his leg and was pulled from the game when they led 24-6, although he has since said it was just precautionary.

Edmonton had led this one 3-0 in the first quarter before Montreal responded with two touchdown passes to make it 14-3 at the end of the quarter. By halftime it was 24-6 as Alexander had thrown another touchdown and the kickers exchanged scores. It looked like Edmonton might score right on the cusp of halftime, but Kabion Ento stepped in front of a Tre Ford passed that looked for all the world destined to hit his receiver Zach Mathis before Ento stole it away at the very last moment imaginable.

Once again, the Als D made an impact on the game, recording 4 sacks, pressuring Ford, and recovering a fumble to set up a short field. Montreal will look to extend their good run next week whilst the Elks (0-2) are still looking for their first win of 2025.

The second game of the weekend was in Toronto as the Toronto Argonauts hosted the Saskatchewan Roughriders. This one was the game of the week as the Riders delivered a stunning 39-32 win coming after the Boatmen had made a spirited comeback, with a return touchdown from ‘Super’ Mario Alford being the game winner.

This was Toronto’s best performance of the season so far, but they still fell to 0-3. This has not happened with Ryan Dinwiddie as coach before. He came into the season with a 46-22 record, three East Division titles, and 2 Grey Cup wins. But they say it when you face adversity a coach that you see the real person. This week that meant Dinwiddie showing his frustration and calling out players. Argos fans will hope the Double Blue can overcome this and not have a toxic culture building behind the scenes.

For Saskatchewan this marks back to backs seasons they have got out of the gate with a 3-0 record. Last year they were 4-0 before finishing 9-8-1 and reaching the West Final. Fans of the green and white will want to kick on from that this time around.

Saskatchewan appear to be setting a pattern with Alford this season. Last week he returned a punt 23-yards and put them in great position, followed by AJ Ouellette cashing in with a 47-yard touchdown run. This week Alford returned a punt to the Toronto 45-yard line and Saskatchewan cashed in with Trevor Harris hitting Dohnte Meyers with back-to-back passes including a 32-yard touchdown. Alford really has been putting the Roughriders in position to succeed so far in this young season.

Toronto have struggled to score early but marched to a major on their opening drive only for the Roughriders to take over to such an extent that they were up 24-10 early in the second half. By the final period it was 32-24 with two minutes on the clock. Nick Arbuckle led the Argos to a touchdown and 2-pont convert to tie it up with little time remaining. Cue Alford and a 99-yard kickoff return touchdown to take the game.

A sharp reminder for Argos fans that they are missing 2024 Most Outstanding Special Teams Player, Janarion Grant. An ankle injury has kept him out so far and they have missed the spark he gives them – just what Alford has been doing for the Riders.

The third game of the weekend was between the Ottawa RedBlacks and the Calgary Stampeders. Maybe this should have been the slip-slide Bowl as it was a wet game with wind that meant some passes went astray and players would occasionally lose footing.

With starting QB Dru Brown out for Ottawa it fell to backup Dustin Crum to lead the RedBlacks and he took them to their first win of the season here grinding out a 20-12 win in The Stamps back yard. He did this mostly with his legs finishing the game 9 of 22 for 111 yards through with 1 touchdown through the air and having 11 carries for 64 yards. The RedBlacks were good on the ground with three players registering over 60 yards or more. They finished with 239 rushing yards on 31 carries, and it was a perfect way to play to the elements.

For Calgary, although Dedrick Mills had 15 carries for 96 yards nobody else came close. Vernon Adams Jr added 21 yards on 3 carries and went 17 of 32 for 218 yards with 1 interception.

They say winning the turnover battle usually leads to winning the game and that was certainly true here as Ottawa forced five turnovers – one fumble, one pick and three times on downs. In the slick conditions it might be what you expect but Ottawa came away without committing a single turnover and that certainly helped them register the win.

The final game of the weekend was the matchup in BC where the BC Lions  faced the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. It was quite the contrast to go from the windswept Calgary field with its potential for ball handling issues to the domed stadium at BC Place. It certainly suited Winnipeg as they won the second of the home-and-home games with BC 27-14 to move to 2-0. The Blue Bombers started fast with a 12 play 72-yard drive that took almost 8 minutes of game time before Zach Collaros hit Dalton Schoen for the opening score. That touchdown marked the 200th touchdown thrown by Collaros in his career.

BC responded with a long drive of their own that stalled deep in Winnipeg territory and settled for a field goal to make it 7-3 in the second quarter. In many ways that was the story of the game as the Winnipeg D kept the Lions out of the end zone for the first three quarters of play. They also had two picks of stand-in Lions QB Jeremiah Masoli (who seemed to have accuracy issues overthrowing his receivers quite a bit) and Jamal Parker returned a fumble 57-yards for a touchdown. Probably the most fun play of the weekend came when, with Winnipeg ahead 20-6, Collaros found offensive lineman Asotui Eli in the end zone for a touchdown. Everybody loves a big man touchdown. This was even better though as Eli ran a fine route and had to stretch out to make the catch.

Week 4 starts out with Edmonton at Winnipeg 1:30 am Friday morning UK time. Of the rest of the games the kickoff times are all around midnight UK time. All these games are available free on CFL+. The league’s free streaming service is a great way to check out some CFL action and see what you think of it. They are also available to catch up the next morning so there is every chance to see some three down action.

MOP's of Week 3:

O – Davis Alexander QB, Montreal Alouettes: 20 of 24 for 254 yards with 3 touchdowns. 1 carry for 11 yards.   

D – Jamal Parker Jr DB, Winnipeg Blue Bombers: 6 tackles, 1 interception, 1 fumble recovery returned for a touchdown.

ST – Mario Alford KR, Saskatchewan Roughriders: 4 kick returns for 172 yards, 4 punt returns for 71 yards and 1 touchdown.

Interdivisional Standings 2025 This Week: East Division 2 West Division 1

Interdivisional Standings 2025 season: East Division 2 West Division 5

CHRIS LAWTON

CFL ANALYST

Chris originally started following the NFL with the ‘first wave’ of fans when it was shown on Channel 4 in the 1980’s. He has been a keen supporter of the Miami Dolphins since 1983. Chris first encountered the CFL in 2016 and instantly fell in love with the Canadian game. He has been writing about the CFL 2017. Chris has a degree in history, postgraduate degree in librarianship and can be found on twitter as @CFLfanUK

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