One of Don Hewitt’s core memories from three years as the furry, minuscule mascot of the Saskatchewan Roughriders in the late 1970s can be summed up in two letters — P.U.

“They’d wash the suit once at the end of the season, and it just stunk,” Hewitt said of the rancid Gainer the Gopher getup.

“They’d ask you to go to different functions, like a Grey Cup thing, and walk into a room with respectable people and whatnot, and it just stunk so bad.”

Canadian football fans will get to see a lot of the gamey but lovable rodent as Roughriders spokeswoman Arielle Zerr confirmed Gainer will travel to Winnipeg ahead of Sunday’s battle for the Grey Cup with the Montreal Alouettes.

In the almost 50 years since his introduction, Gainer has been in everything from commercials to promos with Premier S

See Full Page