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REGINA -- It has long been said that one of the things about living in Saskatchewan is that if your dog runs away from home, you can watch him leave for three days.
If they build a new football stadium in Regina, the dog will still be able to look back and see it for a week.
And while the rest of Canada seems to be incredulous at the idea of the stubble- jumpers building a beautiful new 35,000-40,000 seat stadium, maybe even a dome, smack dab in the middle of a city of 200,000 with no skyline, there's real optimism here that it's going to happen.
It's part of Saskatchewan going from being a have-not province to being more like its neighbour Alberta.
And it's about the Roughriders going from a team for which the province had to forgive a $2.2-million loan just five years ago to one which has become a booming business with a string of sellouts and a brand that's outselling all other CFL teams combined.
"It's crazy isn't it?" said Jim Hopson, the Roughriders' president and CEO, who came on board in 2005 and has been at the helm for the remarkable turnaround of a team that once accepted grain in exchange for season tickets.
Sunday's game here against the Evil Empire, a.k.a the Edmonton Eskimos, has been sold out for ages and the Saskatchewan phenomenon is so hot right now it might even result in selling out next week's rematch in 60,000-seat Commonwealth Stadium.
Despite adding 2,000 extra seats to bring capacity to more than 30,000, you can't get a seat in the rundown old relic formerly known as Taylor Field in the city formerly known as Pile Of Bones.
Saskatchewan fan who wants to see the Riders live are going to have to go to Edmonton, where they've had the billboard up outside Commonwealth Stadium for a couple weeks: "Hey Eskies fans! We'll save a section for you!"
"We love it," said Hopson. "A whole bunch of folks are coming from Lloydminster, Saskatoon and Prince Albert and thousands of ex-pats from all over Alberta."
This weekend, the Roughriders board of directors has invited their Eskimos counterparts to join them here to share ideas between the community-owned clubs.
"We have a very good relationship as you can tell by us giving them all our icons -- Hugh Campbell, Ron Lancaster and Richie Hall -- to be their coaches," Hopson joked.
You can see what's happening here in dozens of different directions. For years, Tom Sheppard's Friends of the Riders Touchdown Lottery has been a story in itself.
"It's been the salvation of the club through the lean years," Hopson said of the lottery, which pays out $1.7 million in prizes.
"This year it sold the most tickets ever in the shortest period of time and was sold out before the early bird deadline," he added of the fundraiser that generates $750,000 for the club each year.
In each of the last two years, the Riders have declared a $1.6 million profit on football operations.
"It's been a remarkable turnaround since 2005. We've gone from revenue of $11 million to $28 million," Hopson said.
As for the Roughriders brand, the rest of the league is turning green with envy.
"It's what they're telling us," said Hopson.
"They say we're now at 53% of league merchandise. You'd think we were the Eskimos."
Actually, that's the goal.
"When I took over, I made the statement that I wanted to model this franchise after the Eskimos. We're not there yet, but we're making our way."
The new stadium would work wonders.
"There's certainly a sense of optimism," said Hopson. "The majority of opinion is that it's something we should do.
"There's lots of excitement about it. There's certainly a sense of optimism that anything is possible. There's a boom in resources like Alberta experienced before us.
"I wouldn't say it's a slam- dunk, but I think there's the general feeling it's something we need to have to be a sports city or province."
Close your eyes and picture the place.
"There's a Fargodome," Hopson said of the stadium in Fargo, N.D. "They're real proud of that place. And we're bigger than Fargo."
TERRY.JONES@SUNMEDIA.CA