Quintessentially Canadian. Quirky. A reward for failure. Embarrassing. All of these have been used to describe a scoring play unique to Canadian football: the rouge.
The rouge (or a single) is a one-point score awarded to the team who kicks the ball into their opponent’s end zone and when the ball is not returned or kicked back out of the end zone by the opposing team. This can be as a result of a kickoff, punt, or missed field goal.
If the opposing team doesn’t get the ball out of their end zone or if the ball passes the dead ball line at the back of the end zone, a single point is scored for the kicking team.
From time to time a debate ensues over whether to keep or get rid of the rouge. Most CFL and Canadian football fans argue it’s an integral part of the Canadian game both strategically and culturally. But, others say its inclusion rewards failure (because a point is often scored on a missed field goal) or, worse, makes the CFL look unprofessional or gimmicky.
Regardless, the debate over the rouge is nothing new. Below is an article that appeared in the Toronto Star in 1912 about abolishing the rouge in Canadian football. Remember, back then Canadian football was often referred to as rugby.
The main argument in this article seems to be that getting rid of the rouge would encourage more touchdowns and drop kicks – and that teams would no longer be able to take advantage of strong winds to score single points.
Source: The Toronto Star, 19 November 1912, page 13. (newspapers.com)
Green is the Colour Football is the Game We’re all together and Winning is our aim So Cheer us on through the sun and rain Saskatchewan Roughriders is our name
It’s a familiar tune to many CFL football fans across the country. The chorus ends with the line, “Saskatchewan Roughriders is our name.” So, just when and why did Regina’s football team become the Roughriders? As you will see, it’s… well…a bit complicated.
The Regina Rugby Club was founded in 1910. They played in the Saskatchewan Rugby Football Union along with teams in Saskatoon and Moose Jaw. The SRFU joined the Alberta and Manitoba leagues to form the Western Canada Rugby Football Union in 1911.
As early as 1912, the Regina club was being called the Roughriders or Rough Riders. The August 31, 1915 edition of the Regina Leader references the Regina Rough Riders as they kick off the 1915 season.
An early reference to the Regina Roughriders (The Saskatoon Daily Star, 19 October 1912, page 22)Source: The Regina Leader, 31 August 1915, page 2 (via newspapers.com)
The early Regina team had a question of identity not only when it came to the club name but also around deciding which team colours to use. The original colours of the Regina Rugby Club were purple and gold. Then, blue and white. Finally, they settled on red and black. In an alternative universe is there a team called the Saskatchewan RedBlacks?
After 1915, the “Rough Riders” moniker seemed to fall out of favour. The local newspaper went back to referring to the team simply as the Regina Rugby Club. But, in 1924, according to official team history, the Regina Rugby Club formally became the Regina Roughriders. After the Second World War, the team became the Saskatchewan Roughriders to represent the entire province and eventually changed their team colours to the familiar green and white.
Source: The Winnipeg Tribune, 3 June 1946, page 14 (via newspapers.com)
So, what is a “Rough Rider” or “Roughrider” anyway? The most likely answer is that it is a reference to the trainers or “rough riders” who broke wild horses on the Prairies. There is a strong suggestion that the Roughrider name was chosen to pay homage to the “rough riders” of the North-West Mounted Police.
An alternative theory is that the Roughriders were named after future United States president Teddy Roosevelt’s Rough Rider cavalry regiment in the Spanish-American War of 1898. However, it’s generally accepted that the Roosevelt/Rough Rider connection is associated more with the Ottawa Rough Riders who played in the East.
Yes, this is where we need to mention that for a long period of time in Canadian football (up to 1996) there were two teams that shared the Rough Riders/Roughriders moniker, each with a distinct yet connected history. This anomoly probably deserves its own blog post at some point.
So cheer us on through the sun and rain…Saskatchewan Roughriders is our name!
This is the fourth of a series of posts that will explore the stories behind the names of the existing Canadian Football League teams. See the previous post on the Edmonton Elks.
In 1996, the Canadian Football League was faced with a dilemma. Having just ended a three-year run of having teams based in the United States, the CFL was retreating north and returning with an all-Canadian lineup. The Baltimore Stallions, the defending Grey Cup champions, relocated to Montreal to become the reborn Alouettes. How could the CFL create an opportunity out of its failed American expansion experiment?
Go radical. That’s how. As the season was about to kick off, the CFL launched a national “Radically Canadian” marketing campaign that was both patriotic and quite edgy. While “Radically Canadian” instilled a sense of Canadian swagger that was rather rare, the campaign also included slogans such as “We Play By Our Rules”, “It’s Called a Rouge, Get the Point?”, “One Tough Mother”, and the famous “Our Balls Are Bigger.”
The 1996 CFL schedule featuring the Radically Canadian logo (source: Canadian Football Research Society)
The Radically Canadian logo appeared on the league’s website, publications, and promotional materials. Fans could purchase t-shirts, hats, and sweatshirts from the online “Rad Shop.” There was even a Radically Canadian dance CD produced. You can find these items for sale secondhand on a number of online sites.
The online “Rad Shop” on the CFL website in 1996
Of course, the campaign wasn’t without controversy. Some found the “Our Balls Are Bigger” and “One Tough Mother” references too risqué. Some teams didn’t carry merchandise with the slogans for fear of offending customers. And, “Radically Canadian” didn’t translate well into French, causing fears its use could potentially stoke English-French tensions that were running high in the mid 1990s.
Source: Montreal Gazette, 13 July 1996, page 63 (newspapers.com)
But, in the end “Radically Canadian” represented a serious effort and investment by an old league looking to reinvigorate itself and broaden its appeal to a younger Canadian fanbase it would need to cultivate for the future. As a marketer and fan, this author gives the campaign a thumbs up. It’s been almost thirty years since the CFL introduced this marketing campaign. Given the current environment, one has to wonder if now just might be a good time to dust off the old “Our Balls Are Bigger” merchandise and once again be “Radically Canadian.”
Throughout the long history of Canadian football, there’s been very little controversy surrounding team nicknames. Sure, there was a time in the not too distant past where there was one team called the Rough Riders and another called the Roughriders. But, for the most part the country’s professional football club names have been a bit quirky sounding but certainly not eyebrow raising.
The one exception to this rule is Edmonton.
Football has been played in the Alberta capital since 1895. Just as it is today, the early Edmonton team’s main rival was Calgary. The story goes that a Calgary sportswriter took a jab at the Edmonton team by calling them “the Esquimaux” (the French translation of Eskimos) in reference to the rather cold northern Alberta climate. The Edmonton team embraced the insult and used the moniker for a number of years before adopting the Anglicized version of the word in 1910.
The team was known as the Edmonton Elks in 1922, foreshadowing a name change that would come a century later, and played Queen’s University in the Grey Cup that year.
The original Eskimo team folded in the 1920s. In 1938, the Edmonton Eskimos were reborn and played in the Western Interprovincial Football Union. However, this team too ceased operations due to the onset of the Second World War.
An ad taken out by Hudson’s Bay Company cheering on the new Edmonton Eskimos (source: Edmonton Journal, 3 September 1949, page 18.
It wasn’t until 1949 that the current Edmonton club returned to the WIFU. Once again Edmonton adopted the Eskimos moniker although there were some suggestions that the team be called the Oilers, the name later given to the city’s future professional hockey team.
For the next seventy years, the Edmonton Eskimos represented Northern Alberta and were considered a model CFL franchise. They won three Grey Cups in a row in the 1950s and won five championships from 1978-1982, an astonishing feat no other team has been able to accomplish.
However. over time a growing number of people voiced their concern over the use of the name “Eskimos.” Facing mounting public pressure, the team announced that it would be dropping the “Eskimos” name in July 2020.
A year later, June 1, 2021, the team announced its new yet familiar name: the Edmonton Elks.
The current Edmonton Elks primary logo (sportslogos.net)
This is the second of a series of posts that will explore the stories behind the names of the existing Canadian Football League teams. Check out the previous post on the BC Lions.
Conventional wisdom says that the Calgary Stampeders are named after the world famous Calgary Stampede rodeo. The Stampeders moniker has been used by numerous Calgary-based teams over the years in football, hockey, and baseball.
In the first half of the 20th century, Calgary’s senior football teams included the Tigers, Canucks, Fiftieth Battalion, Altomahs, and Bronks.
When the Second World War ended, senior football returned to Calgary after a five-year absence. The new club was founded on September 27, 1945 as a cooperative.
Source: Calgary Herald, 28 September 1945, page 16.
Calgary joined Regina and Winnipeg in a condensed 1945 WIFU season. On October 11, the Calgary Herald reported that the new team would be called the “Stampeders” instead of the Bronks, Calgary’s former WIFU entry.
Source: Calgary Herald, 11 October 1945, page 16.
One account indicates that the team was called the Stampeders to help advertise “Stampede Beer” produced by the Calgary Brewing and Malting Company (Source: A history of Football in Calgary, Canadian Football Research Society). As a new cooperative money was tight so any source of revenue would be welcomed.
The newly christened Calgary Stampeders played their first game on October 20, 1945 at Mewata Stadium against the visiting Regina Roughriders.
The 1945 Calgary Stampeders (Source: Canadian Football Research Society)
