Gatewood, Rattlers End Two Streaks
Patrick Daly
Sunday July 14, 2002
The Arizona win marked the end of two streaks. The first, and probably most notable, was the 12 straight wins San Jose had rolled off. Unfortunately for San Jose, number 13 turned out to unlucky. The Rattlers also snapped another streak by beating San Jose for the first time in their last six meetings.
The Arizona defense pulled off an impressive feat by holding the high-powered SaberCat offense to 11 second half points, but the turning point came on offense only seconds before the first half ended. Defensive specialist Kelvin Hunter was signed from the practice squad late in the week in order to fill in for Ricky Parker, but an impromptu appearance on offense, his first offensive snap for the Rattlers, led to a 45-yard touchdown reception from quarterback Sherdrick Bonner that enabled Arizona to pull within ten points of San Jose at halftime.
“I think we needed it a lot,” Hunter said of his touchdown reception. “It was momentum swing.”
As big a play as it was, the impact of the scoring play, and the win itself, still hadn’t hit home for Hunter after the game ended.
“To be honest right now, it hasn’t even hit me yet,” Hunter said. “To me, I just play games like it’s practice. I work hard in practice and I come out here and work hard in the game.”
“Kelvin wasn’t even expecting to play tonight and he ends up being a two-way for us,” Rattlers head coach Danny White said. “He’s never played offense in his life and he makes probably the biggest play in the game.”
With such a difference in play in the second half, the first things you look for are what was said in the locker room and what adjustments the Rattlers made.
“I told them that [San Jose] thought that they had us right where they wanted us. But, in essence, we had them right where we wanted them,” White said. “I just felt like Kelvin’s touchdown right at the end of the half was huge; bigger than anybody realized it was, because we came into the locker room with a spark.
“We were just in the locker room telling each other that we’re not out of this and to keep playing, keep fighting,” Hunter said. “That’s all you have to do.”
After getting burned by big plays in the first half, Arizona went primarily to man-to-man coverages, which reduced the opportunity for miscommunications that occur when handing off an opposing receiver in zone coverage. The result was tighter coverage and more batted balls by defensive specialists Cecil Doggette and Derek Stingley.
“We just locked up and played man-to-man in the second half,” White said. “The one time we played a zone, they had a guy wide open and he ran it down to about the three yard line. That was just a miscommunication thing, and we never should have gone to the zone. The rest of the half it was players just playing.”
And look no further than Hunkie Cooper for an example of a veteran player who went out in the second half and led the charge.
“When you get older, they don’t listen to what you’re saying anymore,” Cooper said. “You’ve got to go out and do it, so we led by example. We went out and made plays. We went out and made good plays on defense and offense and special teams. The young guys rallied around that. They respect you when you, the older guy and you’ve been around and used to winning, and you’re still out there and giving it all you have.”
The Rattlers defense fed off of Hunter’s touchdown and allowed only a 31-yard Daron Alcorn field goal on San Jose’s first three drives of the second half. The defensive line put stronger pressure on San Jose quarterbacks Mark Grieb and John Dutton, while tighter play by the defensive backs kept the SaberCat receivers under control.
When Grieb went down just before the end of the third quarter, the tempo of the San Jose offense changed with Dutton in his place. Dutton didn’t have an opportunity to settle in as he spent most of his time escaping from the pass rush.
“I hope he’s okay,” White said of Grieb. “I understand he’s got a broken collarbone, which is a shame because he’s having a great, great year. I feel for him and I feel for them, but it made a big difference. You could tell the timing was just different when Dutton came in.”
With all of the things that eventually went right for the Rattlers, the biggest was the performance put in by receiver/defensive back Randy Gatewood. Although he’s spent most of the season overshadowed by the efforts of Chris Horn and Maurice Bryant, it was Gatewood’s three touchdowns during a 21-0 run by Arizona that helped turn a 13-point deficit into an eight-point lead early in the fourth quarter.
“I can’t say enough about Randy,” Rattlers receiver/linebacker Hunkie Cooper said. “It’s been tough ever since his rookie year when he won All-Arena honors. He’s been in and out, substituting for people. When you leave him in the football game, there’s nobody better. That’s the man who came through tonight and made key plays in key situations. He was on his game.”
The SaberCats did manage to tie the score at 52-52 after scoring on a drive that took over ten minutes off the clock during the fourth quarter. The drive included 13 plays from scrimmage and six penalties, but Dutton finally found Barry Wagner for a six-yard touchdown and then scored the ensuing two-point conversion.
The Rattlers bounced right back with a scoring drive that ended with Horn fighting his way to the endzone on an 11-yard touchdown run. The Rattlers defense then stepped up one final time, stopping the SaberCats on fourth down with only two seconds remaining in the game.
As well as Gatewood played on Saturday night, Maurice Bryant was that far off of his game. Bryant never got rolling, as both he and Bonner were not on the same page during the first half.
“I don’t know what it was,” White said. “We knew exactly how they were going to play us. We practiced against it all week. We needed his speed. We needed his quickness. He was missing reads. Sherdrick would think he was going deep and he would hook up. Sherdrick would be looking hook up and he went deep. They just weren’t on the same page at all. So we put [Orshawante] Bryant in as the specialist in the second half and Kelvin Hunter had to come in and play two-way.”
Those paying close attention to the lineup noticed that Bo Kelly was the only true fullback/linebacker that was active for the game. The Rattlers used linemen Stacy Evans, Nikia Adderson and Sebastian Barrie at linebacker at different points of the game, which, in addition to linemen Wendall Gaines and Jeff Cummins, put more size on the field for the pass rush.
“We went into the game with Bo [Kelly] as our only fullback,” White said. “We counted on Stacy [Evans] and Nikia Adderson, and we didn’t count on Sebastian Barrie playing linebacker.
“You put four big guys in there and sometimes you can overpower them. I thought Wendall, at the end, was really kind of taking the game over.”
The biggest impact of the win is that Arizona remains the second seed for the playoffs with one game remaining. The Rattlers lead New Jersey and Chicago by one game, but can secure the second spot with a win over New Jersey next Saturday. For now, Arizona will enjoy the win for what it is, but the Rattlers won’t rest easy.
“We’ve got to be careful now,” White said. “There’s the coach in me kicking in. I ought to be in there jumping up and down, screaming with them. We’ve got to be real careful now, emotionally and psychologically, that we don’t let this be the ArenaBowl, because it’s not. It’s just another game now and we’ve got a big one to get ready for next week, and then the playoffs. We’ve got to come back down to Earth pretty quickly.”
Just as White knows the season isn’t over, Cooper knows what has to come next.
“You go back to work,” Cooper said. “You go back and you put your hard hat on and your boots, and you go back to work. You can’t come to work in high heels and tip toe through because you just beat San Jose.”
Patrick Daly has been an Arena Football League enthusiast since he first stumbled across the late-night ESPN broadcasts and has followed the Arizona Rattlers since their inaugural season in 1992. He graduated from Arizona State University with an engineering degree and is currently a member of a web development team for Direct Alliance in Tempe. Patrick currently resides in the Phoenix suburb of Chandler, Arizona with his beautiful wife, son and a very large football helmet collection.
