All Good Things Must Come to an End
Marc Viquez
Thursday April 29, 2004
“In the scheme of things, it hurts,” said Wilpolt after the home loss. “We have to go on and I think nine wins will get us into the playoffs. We still have four more games to get three wins, and two of them are at home. We can get three more wins out of our schedule.”
In the past six victories everything seemed to bounce the ‘Birds’ way, such as the long successful field goal attempts, the long touchdown passes, the ability to score on almost every single drive, the defense making the big plays when needed and not turning over the ball.
A rare sight came for the home crowd as Arizona’s WR/DB Randy Gatewood intercepted an Adrian McPherson pass in the second quarter that eventually leads to a touchdown. It was the first pick by the rookie quarterback since the streak began.
“We lost the turnover battle,” said Wilpolt. “We need to protect the football. We had two to three [turnovers], including that onsides kick, and we usually don’t win with three turnovers.”
That onsides kick, a product of Arizona head coach Danny White’s trickery, came in the second quarter. Indiana appeared to recover it as Jonathan Brown ran it into the end zone for an apparent Firebirds touchdown, but a scrum took place on the field and the ruling was that the Rattlers had recovered. A few short plays later, Arizona had the lead, 20-14, instead of falling behind to Indiana, 21-13.
“You got to make your breaks and we didn’t make it on that onsides kick,” Wilpolt added. “That surprise onsides kick maybe was the difference; that was their stop at the time. It gave them momentum and gave them the lead.”
Another break that did not go the Firebirds way was the incomplete pass in the back of the end zone to close out the half. McPherson marched the team down the field with under a minute left, but Arizona’s WR/DB Orshawante Bryant broke up his pass attempt to Jordan Younger as time expired. It was a call that was based on the team’s energy at the time that Wilpolt thought could pay off with a touchdown.
“Hindsight is 20/20,” said Wilpolt. “Maybe I kick the field goal before halftime, but we thought we had a little momentum. We score and head into the lockeroom on a high note, but instead it got reversed.”
Arizona played almost flawless ball as they converted on all fourth down conversions, a feat alone that could have been the deciding factor in the game, since when you stop them just once, you take away seven points. It was a contest that the Rattlers looked to have taken a commanding lead throughout, but Indiana kept coming back, making a game of it to the very end.
“We did fight,” added Wilpolt. “There was no quit in us, it was just down to that last fourth down and they get it. We made a few mistakes with the turnovers. Defensively, we had a few blown assignments that were minor, but we need to fix those to beat good teams like Arizona.”
The Firebirds look to get back on the winning streak when they visit the 4-7 Las Vegas Gladiators this weekend. With the one loss out of the way, it could be a blessing for this team that has had almost every bit of success on the field since starting 0-5 this year. Wilpolt will look to get his team back on track this Sunday.
“Now that we lost, we have to hammer home and go back to doing the right kind of things,” said Wilpolt. “I knew sometime that this was going to happen. We need to learn from this loss. We will look at film and see what we have to do. We’ll come out fit knowing what we have to change.”
A fan of the sport since 1990 Marc has covered both the New Jersey Gladiators and Cincinnati Swarm (Af2) for Arenafan Online. Marc now resides in Indianapolis after graduating with a Masters in Sports Management from Indiana State University in Terre Haute, Ind. When not at a Firebirds game Marc can be found traveling the Midwest covering sports for various Internet and print publications.
