Matthew Betts may have to play a CFL football game in Regina on Saturday night, but his heart will be 2,466 kilometers away from Quebec City ahead of kickoff.
This is where the BC Lions defender's alma mater, Université Laval, will take on Université de Montréal in the RSEQ Conference Championship. Even seven years after his last game for Rouge et Or, Betts maintains a genuine interest.
“I have a lot to say about that,” he grinned when asked to review the game.
“It's going to be fun. A matchup against a young quarterback from Montreal and a fifth-year guy from Laval, I love that matchup. I watched the second game that was played in Quebec. I thought the Laval defense played very, very well and I feel like it all comes down to the Laval defense stopping the Montreal offense. I'm really, really confident that tomorrow it will be a Laval win and the first ever Jacques Dussault Cup winner.”
Laval, the most successful team in Canadian university football, is 7-1 this season, with its only loss coming on the road to rival Montreal in mid-September by a 38-28 margin. However, Rouge et Or got their revenge by defeating the Carabines at home a month later, winning 16–6 in front of a record crowd of 21,399 at the Stade Telus.
The Carabines, who finished the regular season 6-2, are led by freshman quarterback Pepe Gonzalez, the favorite to win the Peter Gorman Trophy as U Sports' top rookie. He led the RSEQ with 2,284 passing yards and 19 touchdowns, but was not named a conference all-star. This distinction went to MVP RSEQ, Arnaud Desjardins, a two-time Vanier Cup winner who completed a national-best 75.6 percent of his passes for 1,873 yards, 14 touchdowns and four interceptions in his final season with U Sports.
The latest clash between the pair will be a historic moment for soccer in Quebec as the newly renamed RSEQ conference title will be contested for the first time. Known as the Dunsmore Cup since 1984. it will now be called the Jacques Dussault Cup. in honor of the Carabins' first head coach – complete with a new trophy.
Despite his Laval affiliation, Betts supports the change.
“I'm glad they paid tribute to Jacques Dussault. He was an amazing football player in Quebec, so I'm very happy that he was honored in this way,” he said. “I saw the new trophy which seemed a little strange. I hope the boys take care of it when they win tomorrow.”
Betts is one of the most accomplished players in Laval program history. After turning down a scholarship to Purdue to stay closer to home, he won the Peter Gorman Trophy as a freshman in 2015 and went on to win three straight JP Metras Trophies as Canada's top university lineman. Along the way, he helped Rouge et Or win a pair of Vanier Cups.
That success continued at the professional level, where Betts was named to the All-CFL team twice for the Lions. He won the league's Most Outstanding Defensive Player award in 2023 and was a finalist for the award this season after leading the CFL in sacks.
These feats keep him from seeing every game his alma mater plays, but he remains as connected to his roots as possible.
“When it's on TV and we're not playing at the same time, I really enjoy watching the games. Last time they played Montreal, me and Adam (Auclair) watched them at my house. I follow what they do and a lot of the guys I played with are now young coaches in the state,” he said.
“Glen (Constantine), Juice (Justin Ethier) and Mark (Fortier) are still on staff and they've been there forever. I follow the coaches that coached me, the young coaches I played with and even the young players now. We chat on Instagram from time to time, just to congratulate them and tell them we support them. It's really interesting and I certainly really enjoy following Rouge et Or.”
Laval and Montreal are scheduled to tip off at 1:00 pm EST on Saturday, November 8, meaning Betts should know the result before he and the Lions face the top-seeded Saskatchewan Roughriders in the Western final at 6:30 pm EST.
On the way to their 12th Vanier Cup title last season, Rouge et Or came away with a narrow 17-14 victory over the Regina Rams in the national semifinals. Playing on the same field at Mosaic Stadium with the same goal, Betts is hoping for the same result, but with less drama.
“That would be great. Hopefully not as tense as the game last year when Arnaud Desjardins had to lead the field in that last minute,” he chuckled. “If we have to do it, I feel like (Nathan Rourke) could do it. I haven't thought about it, but I hope we rewrite history that way. That would be pretty cool.”
