CFL 'Quick Kicks' 2026: Week 12

By Chris Lawton

Welcome to week twelve of our weekly review of each week of the 2026 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.

If last week’s theme was skids ending, this week’s was records falling, some of them the good kind, most of them decidedly not. Montreal made it seven wins on the bounce and are cruising towards the East Division title with the sort of inevitability normally reserved for a British summer turning to rain. Ottawa, meanwhile, became the sixth team in modern CFL history to start a season 0-10, which even by their own grim standards this year is quite the milestone, and there was late drama in Edmonton, Toronto and Vancouver besides.  Get the kettle on. It’s time for a brew and a biccy whilst you catch up on the 3 down league’s latest goings-on.

The first game of the week took the Montreal Alouettes back onto the field out of the bye, and they picked up precisely where they left off, taking apart the Ottawa REDBLACKS 46-16 at Percival Molson Memorial Stadium on Thursday night to move to a frankly ludicrous 9-1 on the season. This is now seven wins in a row for Montreal, the last four of which have arrived by an average of over twenty points, and it is genuinely getting difficult to find fresh ways of saying “the Alouettes were very, very good. Again.”

Davis Alexander kept his perfect home record intact, going 20 of 23 for 260 yards and two touchdowns, both of them to Tyson Philpot, who now leads the league with eight receiving majors on the year. Cole Spieker led all Montreal receivers with 89 yards, and Travis Theis went over 100 total yards for the fifth time in his last six games, adding a rushing score of his own in the third quarter. It was Montreal’s defence that really turned this into a rout, though, forcing five takeaways on the night, including a Kabion Ento interception return touchdown after he had already scooped up a botched Ottawa field-goal snap and raced it to the red zone a few minutes earlier. That is the sort of afternoon, or in this case evening, you have when absolutely nothing is going your way.

Ottawa actually started brightly, an eight-minute, fourteen-play opening drive ending with a Bryson Barnes plunge to make it 7-0, and for a few minutes it looked as though the REDBLACKS might finally have their day. They did not. Jake Maier finished with 126 yards and two interceptions before being pulled in the fourth quarter in favour of McLeod Bethel-Thompson, who promptly threw one of his own, and the defence conceded 457 net yards in the process. Ryan Dinwiddie confirmed afterwards that Maier’s benching had been under consideration since the third quarter. “We thought about doing that in the third quarter,” he told TSN 1200. “I said, ‘Let’s give Jake one more.’ Then we went down another score.” Maier, for his part, sounded like a man trying to make peace with a situation that has become almost unbearably bleak. “I had a good conversation with Coach about it,” he said. “We just had too many unfortunate, crippling plays, and I had to do with a couple of them, for sure.”

The defeat drops Ottawa to 0-10, only the sixth team in the modern era of the league to start a season that poorly, and their overall losing streak, stretching back into last season, now sits at sixteen straight games, the longest in modern CFL history. It is also the second-longest losing streak for any CFL team ever. The longest one? Ironically, an Ottawa team that lost 25 games on the bounce between 1928 and 1932.  

Dinwiddie would not commit to a change at quarterback, though he did concede that rookie third-stringer Bryson Barnes could be in line for a look before too much longer. Whatever happens next in the nation’s capital, it will not be dull, in the way that only a genuine crisis can be interesting to everyone except the people living through it.

Player of the Game: Tyson Philpot, WR, Montreal Alouettes. Two touchdown catches to extend his league lead to eight for the season, part of a Montreal receiving corps that is simply overwhelming teams at the moment. 9 catches for 75 yards, 2 receiving touchdowns.

The second game of the week was the pick of the weekend if you like your football with a side of cardiac arrest, as the Edmonton Elks erased a sixteen-point deficit before Vincent Blanchard drilled a 40-yard field goal as time expired to beat the Winnipeg Blue Bombers 22-19 at Commonwealth Stadium on Friday night. Edmonton move to 8-3 and now sit four points clear of the chasing pack in the West, having also wrapped up the season series against Winnipeg in the process.

The first half belonged entirely to the Bombers. Zach Collaros had 190 yards passing before the interval, Brady Oliveira was bulldozing his way to early yardage, and a Jonathan Moxey interception of Cody Fajardo set up a Sergio Castillo field goal that made Castillo the CFL’s all-time leader in field goals of fifty-plus yards, for good measure. Winnipeg led 16-0 at one stage and were outgaining Edmonton 297-79 at the three-minute warning of the second quarter, the sort of numbers that should really have put this one to bed. Instead, back-to-back two-and-outs from Winnipeg’s own offence let the Elks stay within touching distance, and Fajardo found Austin Mack in the flat right before half-time to make it 16-6.

Edmonton took full control of the third quarter, with Justin Rankin bursting through for chunks of yardage to set up a Fajardo touchdown plunge that tied it at 16-16, and the Elks defence, which had been suffocating for large stretches, forced a fifth straight Winnipeg two-and-out to open the fourth. The two sides traded field goals down the stretch; Blanchard put Edmonton ahead with just over six minutes to go, Castillo’s 53-yarder levelled it with under two minutes left, before Fajardo and company put together one last drive, leaning on tackle-breaking catch-and-runs from Rankin and T.J. Luther to set up Blanchard for the winner as the clock hit zero. Rankin finished with 141 yards from scrimmage, his best total since Week 6, while Fajardo threw for 259 yards with a passing and a rushing score on the night. Oliveira rushed for 118 yards in defeat but had just two touches in the entire second half as the Bombers’ offence went cold at precisely the wrong moment, dropping Winnipeg to 5-5.

Player of the Game: Justin Rankin, RB, Edmonton Elks. 93 yards on 19 carries plus 48 through the air on 4 receptions. He was the man doing the heavy lifting on Edmonton’s game-winning drive when it mattered most. 141 yards from scrimmage.

The third game of the week was an East Division derby played through the medium of a genuine downpour, as the Toronto Argonauts weathered both Hamilton and the weather itself to beat the Tiger-Cats 39-20 at home on Saturday night. A result that gets Toronto back to .500 and levels up the QEW Series ahead of what will be a rather more consequential meeting between these two on Labour Day weekend.

Storms in the area delayed kickoff by an hour, and once the game did get underway it was Toronto who made the early running, Chad Kelly rolling out on play-action for a 35-yard touchdown to Damonte Coxie on the opening drive while Hamilton stuttered through three consecutive two-and-outs. Hamilton, with Tre Ford back under centre after his impressive relief effort against Saskatchewan the week before, found their footing before the break, a Larry Rountree III score and a Jake Dolegala touchdown run putting the Ticats up 17-15 at half-time, which after that start will have felt like something of a heist.

The Argos simply overwhelmed them after the interval. Kelly hit Kevin Mital for a second touchdown to cap a ten-play drive, added a third to Coxie off the back of a Shawn Lemon strip-sack on Ford, and finished the job himself with a one-yard rushing score in the fourth. Kelly ended the night 26 of 34 for 289 yards, three touchdown passes and a rushing major, while Coxie hauled in both of his scores and Tyler Kahmann added 74 yards of his own. Isaiah Smith, promoted into the starting backfield role, added 99 yards on the ground as Toronto ran for a season-high 145 yards as a team. Ford was far from disgraced in defeat, throwing for 356 yards with Kiondre Smith and Keric Wheatfall both going over the century mark, but four sacks and a costly turnover proved too much to overcome. The result puts Toronto at 5-5 and Hamilton at 4-7, with Scott Milanovich’s side facing an away trip to Calgary next up and no shortage of questions about who starts at quarterback when they get there.

Player of the Game: Chad Kelly, QB, Toronto Argonauts. Three touchdown passes and a rushing score in filthy conditions, and the man who took the game away from Hamilton after the break. 26 of 34 for 289 yards, 3 passing TDs,  2 carries for 7 yards & 1 rushing TD.

Hamilton vs Toronto

The final game of the week saw the BC Lions complete a rather remarkable turnaround, beating the Saskatchewan Roughriders 30-16 at BC Place on Sunday night to climb all the way back to .500 on the season, courtesy of a fourth straight win. Given BC were sat at 1-5 not so long ago, that is about as complete a reversal of fortune as you will see in this league, and revenge on the team that beat them back in Week 2 will have made it taste even sweeter. You just know the Lions fans had a (watermelon) smashing time at this game. I know, that’s terrible – but I couldn’t resist!

Nathan Rourke was excellent again, going 22 of 28 for 355 yards and two touchdowns, moving into fifth all-time on the BC Lions passing chart in the process. The bigger story on the night, though, was the Lions’ defence, which caused fits for Trevor Harris and the Riders’ offence throughout, picking him off twice, through T.J. Lee and Stantley Thomas-Oliver, while Deontai Williams forced and recovered a fumble, and BC closed the door late with a turnover on downs. Jevon Cottoy had a game-high 110 yards on six catches and his first touchdown of the season, handing the ball to his mother in the crowd for her first-ever visit to BC Place, a nice moment amid an otherwise pretty one-sided defensive battle. Keon Hatcher Sr. added the second Lions touchdown, and Zander Horvath punched in a third-quarter rushing score as BC pulled clear.

Harris still went over 300 yards passing, finding Dhel Duncan-Busby for a touchdown, but the two picks proved costly, as did a couple of penalties that wiped out Saskatchewan scoring plays altogether. Samuel Emilus made his long-awaited return from injury and led the Riders with 66 yards on seven catches, before going down again late in the fourth with what looked like another injury concern, hardly the way Rider Nation would have wanted to see him back. The defeat is Saskatchewan’s second in a row, the first time they have lost back-to-back games all season, dropping them to 6-4 and out of the top spot in the West, with a rubber match against BC still to come at BC Place in Week 17.

Player of the Game: Nathan Rourke, QB, BC Lions. Two touchdown passes, over 300 yards for the 25th time in his CFL career, and the steady hand that BC’s defence didn’t really need much help from.  22 of 28 for 355 yards, 2 passing TDs, 1 interception. 1 carry for 19 yards.

Standings

So that is week twelve done and dusted, and the picture at both ends of the league is becoming awfully clear. Montreal are running away with the East at 9-1 and could realistically wrap up the division within a couple of weeks, while Ottawa’s 0-10 start has now produced the longest losing streak in modern CFL history and a genuine quarterback dilemma to go with it. Out west, Edmonton’s four-point cushion at the top looks increasingly secure, Saskatchewan’s first proper wobble of the season has opened the door for BC’s remarkable recovery act, and Winnipeg will be wondering how on earth they let a sixteen-point lead in Edmonton slip through their fingers. Toronto and Hamilton, meanwhile, have set up a proper decider for Labour Day weekend, for whatever bragging rights are still on offer in the East beyond Montreal.

Until next week, CFL friends!

Interdivisional Standings 2026 This Week: East Division 0, West Division 0

Interdivisional Standings 2026 This Season: East Division 9, West Division 14

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

Rated 5 out of 5