Destroyers Spoil Phantoms Debut to Win 61-54
Greg Kasprzak
Sunday April 15, 2001
However, that didn’t seal the win for Buffalo as Toronto had one last ditch attempt on the last play of the game. The officials ruled that Toronto WR Damian Harrell didn’t have control of the football when he landed in the end zone on Pat O’Hara’s hail mary attempt and it was incomplete giving Buffalo the win.
In a tale of two halves, Buffalo looked sluggish on offense and the defense could not figure out how to stop Toronto’s offense in the first half. Jim Kubiak, making his AFL debut at QB for Buffalo, seemed to have trouble getting the plays in and the ball snapped on time. He stuck mainly to the screen pass for most of the 1st half.
Four offensive penalties and no running attack for Buffalo didn’t help as they trailed the entire first half.
Meanwhile, the Destroyer’s defense could not figure out how to stop Phantom’s QB Pat O’Hara. He completed his first nine passing attempts and the Phantoms scored on their first five possessions. A spectacular circus catch at the back of the end zone by Destroyer’s WR Bobby Olive with 28 seconds left in the first half cut the Phantoms lead to 35-28.
 Kubiak steps up in the second half, securing a win for Buffalo. Image courtesy of Tom Ando |
No one came out a clear winner just yet though. In the last 7:48, there were four more lead changes. Buffalo finished the scoring on a 22-yard Kubiak-to-Eddie Brown touchdown pass and the ensuing 2-point conversion late in the fourth quarter.
Kubiak completed 23 of his 31 passes for 256 yards and 3 touchdowns while Kevin Mason and Bobby Olive made eight catches each. Buffalo’s backup QB, Aaron Sparrow, missed the game because of a right shoulder injury.
GAME NOTES-
The Destroyers, now in their third AFL season, won for the first time on Opening Day. It was also the inaugural game for the Toronto Phantoms who relocated from New England after last season. The Destroyers open at home next Friday against the newly named New Jersey Gladiators.
The Phantoms play at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto and there was a large but quiet crowd on hand. The starting time of the game was moved to 4pm because of the Toronto vs Ottawa NHL Playoff game scheduled to start at 7pm in Ottawa.
The game was televised in Buffalo and the WNY area on the Empire Sports Network (Tape Delayed) courtesy of CTV Sportsnet in Toronto. A neat feature on the telecast was the live audio conversations on the sidelines between Phantoms Head Coach Marc Stoutte and QB Pat O’Hara.
Greg Kasprzak was a writer for ArenaFan Online during the 2001 season.
