The Saskatchewan Roughriders haven’t missed a beat so far without star receivers Kian Schaffer-Baker and Sam Emilus, a good sign even if much of that limited sample size came against the winless Ottawa Redblacks.
It’s something those backfilling their spots, like Johnny Johnson III, take great pleasure in.
“I made some plays. It just happened to turn out that way,” Johnson said. “Football, it could be different every night. Just staying ready for those opportunities helped me have a day like that.”
Johnson, a CFL rookie, had his breakout game last Friday in a 42-20 home win against the Redblacks.
The 27-year-old caught all seven passes that came his way for 117 yards. His longest haul was a 51-yard play. Five of his receptions came in the second half as he shifted to becoming an integral part of the offence.
“I think it was just a matter of time,” Johnson said. “Those looks are there, but we’re piecing it together as the game goes on. (Offensive coordinator Marc) Mueller comes in, tells us what we need to change, where we're going to hit the next half, and we put it all together on the field.”
Dhel Duncan-Busby is another pass catcher whose role has been elevated because of the Schaffer-Baker and Emilus injuries.
His most productive game of the season came on Aug. 1 in Edmonton when Emilus missed his first game with an ankle issue and Schaffer-Baker left partway through with a knee problem. Duncan-Busby caught all four passes that quarterback Trevor Harris threw to him and picked up 66 yards.
“I’m definitely seeing what’s going on,” Duncan-Busby said. “I trust my eyes. Obviously, I put in a lot of work throughout the week and seeing the different type of defences that we could be going up against. The coaches put us in a really good position to be able to understand what it is that we’re going up against. I would say that the game is definitely slowing down for me.”
The receivers’ success comes down to a couple of facets. The first is adaptability.
Duncan-Busby moved from his slotback slot to wide receiver after his fellow hyphenated teammate got hurt. He’s slated to start his second game at wideout on Saturday when the Riders take on the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.
Johnson, a fellow slotback, has been used in different spots and packages compared to earlier in the season, too.
“There’s a lot of guys here counting on me,” Johnson said. “I take that very serious in knowing my job, so that I don’t get nobody else hurt or hurt the team and affect plays in the wrong way. Being on the playbook has always been something that I take a lot of pride in.”
The other factor that’s made them successful working together and having each other’s backs. That’s imperative with so much change.
“I feel like we do a really good job of communicating as an offence,” Duncan-Busby said. “Even if I don't know what it is that I may be doing, I can rely on my teammates and my brothers to be able to figure out what it is that I got to do. But I also have been in the offence for three years, too, so I do understand a good amount of the offence, too.”
Johnson said that communication helps the slow the game down and keep everyone calm. It showed last week.
In addition to Johnson’s big week, Dylan Djete and D’Sean Mimbs had their best CFL outings. Djete caught all four of the passes Harris targeted him for, recording 53 yards and his first touchdown in his first career start. Mimbs, a second-year Rider, pulled in six catches for 86 yards.
“It’s just going to be like practice, just helping those guys be at ease,” Johnson said.
The next step is to keep the ball moving down the field against the Ticats, who have the second-ranked pass defence in the CFL.
That’ll be a good test for the revamped Riders receiving corps but one they’re excited to persevere against and use as a springboard for bigger things later in the season.
“As long as we’re on the same page and we’re not killing ourselves on the field, I think that that momentum could be something that snowballs all the way to the Grey Cup,” Johnson said. “That’s the goal.”
