Queen's Football running back Rasheed Tucker finished the regular season with 114 carries for 697 yards and eight touchdowns, and has added another 48 carries for 359 yards and four touchdowns in the OUA Playoffs so far. Tucker (Ajax, Ont.), was also named the Canadian Football Perspective OUA Offensive Player of the Week four times this season. He sat down ahead of the Yates Cup to talk about Queen's undefeated regular season and facing the Mustangs Saturday at Richardson Stadium.
 
Can you reflect on your undefeated season and the work that it took to accomplish that?
 
Tucker: In order to accomplish an undefeated season, it's one of the most challenging things in sports entirely. There is so much determination, resilience, consistent effort that has to go into that.
 
For us particularly, playing in a split conference this year where we had to play multiple teams three times, in order to win, that certainly presented a very good challenge in that teams have a chance to get a feel for your systems and the way you play offensively and defensively. They get to scout up on the film and play you again and again. That obviously gives teams an opportunity to key in on some of our tendencies. From a scheme perspective, our coaches have to be more keen to breaking tendencies game to game.
 
I was really proud of both the players on our team and the coaching staff for working as hard as we had to work with that extra challenge of playing teams multiple times in a season. It was absolutely terrific to go undefeated in the regular season.
 
Do any personal or team highlights from the regular season stand out to you now?
 
Tucker: My personal favourite team highlight from this season was the Guelph game (14-8 win for Queen's). It was an incredible atmosphere, a nice Friday night game before Thanksgiving weekend against a cross-conference rival in Guelph. And it was a game that we went in to as the underdog, much like some might say we are this weekend. A lot of people had been chattering online and didn't expect us to really compete with Guelph and we went out and we played a physical 60 minutes of football and we won the game.
 
It was at that point that I think we really understood, even though we believed in ourselves all season, we knew that we can win this league, we're the top team, and we showed that.
 
You and Keon Edwards were the top two running backs in the OUA in terms of yards this season. Is there any extra motivation going up against him on Saturday or is it all about getting the team win?
 
Tucker: Keon Edwards is a very good running back as well and he's accomplished some great things this season. I commend him on that.
 
I haven't thought about that at all. It's really about getting this team win. Myself, I won't be going up against Keon, I'll be going up against the Mustangs defence. While I've certainly heard some chatter about what that matchup of running backs will be like, it doesn't really mean anything to me. I wish him the best, he's a good running back. I'm just worried about the Mustangs defence and dominating them all game.
Did you notice any differences between the regular season games and last week's playoff game in terms of preparation or intensity?
 
Tucker: I'd say we prepped the same way week-to-week in the regular season as we did for both of the playoff games. The only difference would be there was a little extra intrinsic motivation when you know that you're fighting for your football life.
 
For me, while I give it all every single game, there's been something else in the back of my mind. If this could be your last play, how would you want to go out with it? Playoff time, stakes are higher and it just gives a little more motivation.
 
You're coming off two playoff games against familiar opponents, what challenges are there to taking on a team you haven't played before?
 
Tucker: It's certainly a different challenge than we've been faced with most of this season, going up against the Mustangs this weekend. We haven't played them at all in the regular season. We also haven't played many of their opponents through the regular season.
 
This week has come down to a lot of video preparation. We don't have a feel obviously of going up against them as we did for Ottawa and Carleton. It's been about getting into the film, trying to pick up on some tendencies of their players, their defence, and their scheme as a whole.
 
That being said, our coaches are the best across the country and they're doing a really great job of breaking things down for us and preparing us for anything they could throw at us. And at the end of the day, football is football. Defences from this side of the conference to that side of the conference aren't all too different. 
 
How excited are you and the team to be playing for the Yates Cup?
 
Tucker: To play in the Yates Cup, it's an absolute dream come true. This is a game when you talk about football in Canada, it's one of the biggest. The Yates Cup is the most historic trophy that can be won in all of North America in football. This is a game that I used to watch with my brothers and my parents on television growing up. To be playing in it, to be a feature guy in the game, is an absolute dream come true and it's everything that I've been working for. I'm definitely going to give it my all and lay it all on the line.
 
What does home field advantage and having a stadium full of Queen's fans at Richardson Stadium cheering for you on Saturday mean?
 
Tucker: To be playing at Richardson is a huge advantage. Not only do we practice on that field every night, we played all of our home regular season games and both of our first two playoff games on that field. To have the community behind us, I know I have a ton of classmates out there, professors, other friends within the Athletics community, the Gaels family, a ton of my family will be there as they typically are at our games.
 
It's just a familiar atmosphere, it will be a familiar feeling, and it will be nice, if we are victorious in the game, be able to celebrate right here at home. It's a huge advantage. It's something that we were gunning for all season and it was another box that we were able to tick on our checklist of things that we wanted to accomplish this season.