The 0-12 Ottawa Redblacks are switching things up as they search for their elusive first win of the 2026 season.
McLeod Bethel-Thompson will start at quarterback for Saturday's game against the Calgary Stampeders, the team announced Tuesday.
It will mark Bethel-Thompson's first start for the Redblacks this season, as Jake Maier started the previous 12 games.
Bethel-Thompson came in to replace Maier in last weekend's 26-23 loss to the Toronto Argonauts, Ottawa's 18th consecutive defeat dating back to last season, a modern-day CFL record.
Bethel-Thompson gave the Redblacks a bit of a boost, throwing for 192 yards and a touchdown before a loss on a walk-off field goal.
“There are no moral victories when your backs are against the wall like this,” Bethel-Thompson said after the loss. “If you don’t get that zero, that goose egg off the board, it means nothing."
What would a single victory mean for the Redblacks' new starter?
"Everything, man,” Bethel-Thompson said. “Just to get the weight off our shoulders. Just to stop talking about us, everyone's adding more weight to it. We feel that, we're humans. Just get the goose egg off our shoulders and not be some stupid mark in the long history of this.”
Bethel-Thompson is in his eighth CFL season and has won two Grey Cups with the Argonauts.
