The Little General Is Dead

By 250 Sports

Prince George, B.C.-  CFL fans, and Saskatchewan RoughRider fans in particular are in shock and mourning as word  Ron Lancaster has  succumbed to lung cancer.

Lancaster started his professional playing career as a quarterback with the Ottawa Rough Riders, 1960-1962. Ottawa won the  Grey Cup in his rookie season in 1960, and he spent two more years with Ottawa, sharing the quarterback's role with another future Hall of Famer, Russ Jackson.  Lancaster was traded to the  Saskatchewan Roughriders in 1963.

Lancaster played 16 seasons with Saskatchewan (1963-1978); he led the team into the playoffs for the next 14 consecutive seasons and to the CFL's Weswtern Football Conference final 12 times, representing the west in the Grey Cup in 1966, 1967, 1969, 1972, and 1976. However the Roughriders won once, that being in 1966 when they defeated the Ottawa Rough Riders 29-14.

The Roughriders won 170 games with Lancaster at quarterback before he retired after 19 seasons as a player. In all of seasons with the Roughriders, the team had only one losing record, 4-11-1 in 1978, which was Lancaster's final season as a quarterback. In fact of his 19 seasons he had only one other losing record, that in 1962 with the  Ottawa Rough Riders at 6-7-1.

He was third all-time on the CFL's career list with 3,384 pass completions, 6,233 pass attempts and 50,535 yards passing and fell to second all-time with 333 touchdown passes in 2003, when Toronto’s Damon Allen surpassed Lancaster’s mark. Since then Danny McManus moved into second place all-time with passing yards with 53,165.

Lancaster won the  Schenley Award as most outstanding player in 1970 and 1976 and was a finalist for the award in 1966. He was an All-Canadian in 1970, 1973, 1975 and 1976 and a Western all-star in 1966, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1973, 1975 and 1976. In November, 2006, Lancaster was voted one of the CFL's  Top 50 players (#7) of the league's modern era by The Sports Network/TSN.

Lancaster was a player-coach in the 1977 and 1978 seasons, serving as Saskatchewan's offensive co-ordinator.

He became Saskatchewan's head coach immediately after his 1978 playing season but found "the glorious fifties and sixties were over, and he was the first Roughrider coach in sixteen years who did not have Ron Lancaster at quarterback." ^[The Green Riders finished 2-14 in consecutive seasons and Lancaster would not coach again for 11 years.

He was named 12th head coach in Edmonton Eskimos  history on February 4, 1991. He coached the Eskimos from 1991-1997, amassing an 83-42 regular season record and a Grey Cup win in 1993. He passed Hugh Campbell for first place on the Eskimos' list for coaching wins October 27th, 1996.

Lancaster became the 17th head coach in Hamilton Tiger-Cat history on November 26, 1997. He coached the Tiger-Cats from 1998-2003. He took the team to the Grey Cup twice (1998, 1999) winning it in 1999. On July 10, 2006 Ron Lancaster was re-hired as the teams head coach on an interim basis after the firing of coach Greg Marshall.

Lancaster’s 142 career regular-season wins, place him fifth on the CFL’s career regular season wins list.

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