Three More Zeros
Charliy Nash
Tuesday April 26, 2005
At one point during the game, Kats’ FB/LB Levelle Brown walked over to me with a big grin visible through his facemask and said, "This is a lot more fun, isn’t it?"
If you were looking for the defining element that separates the second half of the season from the first half, it would be that the Kats are having fun. They’re more confident; they’re playing more as a team – but the big difference is that they’re having fun. This looser approach has taken the pressure off the young players, and the results have been amazing.
The Kats now lead the league in sacks. Rookie lineman Nate Bolling, playing in his first AFL game, added to that total. He fought through blocks for what I’d describe as a "refuse to give up" sack, but Bolling had another word for it. "It’s just my game," he explained, "it’s an ‘effort sack.’ Every play I’ll make is not because I’m a good athlete – I’m an effort guy."
The man who most enjoyed the win was former Storm player T.T. Toliver, who once again contributed two touchdowns. "Oh man, it was really sweet," he admitted, but was quick to credit others for the recent success, "Our defense is playing great. All the credit goes to the defense, the defensive line, the defensive backs. I’ve got to give all the credit to Khalil [Carter], Reggie [Stephens], and DeRon [Jenkins]."
Big plays kept coming from the Nashville defensive line. Joe Minucci deflected a Tampa Bay field goal attempt. Aaron McConnell outran Storm fullback Umar Muhammad and brought him down from behind on a screen play. When the Kats didn’t stop the Storm, they stopped themselves with penalties that took points off the scoreboard and put them in very long yardage situations.
Still when the one-minute warning was called, the outcome of the game was far from certain. The Storm had the ball inside the ten yard line and were threatening to score. With an onside kick and two-point conversions, we could easily have been heading to overtime. It was obvious that everyone had done the math, because there was a moment, when Storm QB threw a pass into the end zone to Lawrence Samuels, that the arena was so quiet that I could hear the rustling of the cheerleaders’ pompoms. That’s when Reggie Stephens made the first interception of his AFL career. He cut in front of Samuels and tipped the ball; both men had their hands on the ball, but Stephens came down with it. "We both fought for it, I wanted it badder than he did," said Stephens.
That fits perfectly with a song we hear before every Kats’ home game: Tim McGraw’s "How Bad Do You Want It?"
Charliy Nash has covered both incarnations of the Nashville Kats, and now has make the 2 hour drive to Huntsville for an Arena Football fix. He also covers the Tennessee Titans as a blogger for nfl.com and still hopes this will eventually lead to a paying gig.
