With cuts now out of the way, Riders Head Coach Craig Dickenson got down to work on Sunday as the Saskatchewan Roughriders held their first practice of the regular season at Mosaic Stadium Sunday afternoon.

As one would expect after the first practice, the quarterback was the focus, but it was 3rd string quarterback Isaac Harker answering the questions as he beat out David Watford to earn the job.

Harker, from the Colorado School of Mines near Denver, impressed many in the pre-season both in games and at practices including Dickenson.

“He’s been good all camp.” Dickenson said after practice. ” We kind of kept looking for a little chink in his armour and we didn’t really see it. He just got steadily better each and every day.”

Once he was signed by the football team, Harker says he started doing research on the team so he knew what type of environment he was walking into.

I had to research the watermelon emoji and stuff like that,” the 23-year-old said.  Everybody knows about it and they have such a rich history here.”

The team will practice at Mosaic Stadium Monday and Tuesday (closed practice) before leaving for Hamilton and Thursday’s season-opener.

That game will start at 5:30 with our pre-game coverage on 620 CKRM starting at 2:30