Firebirds and Nuns. Who Knew?
Matthew Pickut
Sunday August 12, 2001
In the end, I think OS Eddie Brown beat me to it, “We just thank God we are still playing. It doesn’t matter [who were playing next week].” Last week’s victory over the Storm set up the third meeting between division rivals Grand Rapids and Indiana. Brown might just be happy to still be playing, but at this point anything less then a victory ends the season as a disappointment.
Head Coach Mike Dailey knows what faces him, “Obviously they’re an excellent football team as their record shows. They’re playing with a lot of confidence right now. It will be a tough place to play, so we’re going to have to play mistake free football if we expect to win.”
In the past two meetings the Rampage made the Firebirds pay for every mistake they made. Grand Rapids won both match-ups this season by a total of just seven points, including a one point overtime victory in game one of the season. After that first loss, I will never forget the attitude of WR/LB Greg ‘Hop’ Hopkins. He walked into the media room and saw the downcast looks on the media members (I guess I wasn’t the only one cheering in the press box). “Come on guys, its just one game,” he said. It may have been just one game but it seems that the successes of the Firebirds’ season rests on not reliving that one loss for a third time.
In that first game, K Nelson Garner’s shaky start put the ‘Birds behind the eight ball from the beginning. Ever since that game, Garner’s play put away any doubt about his status. Against Tampa Bay last week, Garner hit four of four of his field goal attempts as well as eight of eight PAT’s. Garner tied the franchise post-season record with a 57-yard field goal to tie his personal all-time best.
Normally you do not hear much about a kicker unless he loses a game for you, but Garner’s performance last week drew rave reviews from Brown, "That was big time. Early in the year, Nelson had missed a few kicks, and I kept saying to him ‘there is going to come a time when we are going to need you to hit that and playoff time, Arena Bowl time you are going to hit that.’ He believed that and kept plugging and we gave the game ball for this game to him. He won the game for us.”
Even Coach Dailey, who stayed with Garner all season, praised his game. “Nelson just had a great game. He was hitting the ball well and those types of plays seemed to go our way today. We just had it going and everything that happened went our way.”
It seems like Indiana is peaking at just the right time. It looked like that earlier this season, however, and the Firebirds failed to capitalize on the momentum. Each of the team’s four losses, not counting the opening loss to Grand Rapids, came after decisive wins.
The Rampage, on the other hand, roll into Sunday’s game with a five-game winning streak and a hot QB. Despite QB Clint Dolezel’s meager stat line last week, 13 of 25 for 165 yards and one touchdown, he remains deadly. Dolezel’s slant passes can decimate a defense before it can even begin to compensate. Last week the Rampage focused on the running game and still built a lead big enough to insert back up QB Nick Browder in the fourth quarter.
Defensively, the Rampage scored on two safeties and recorded two sacks on nine QB hurries. The Chicago Rush scored on only three of their ten possessions totaling 21-points. If the Firebirds are to make it to Arena Bowl XV, they will obviously need to do better against the Rampage than the Rush did.
For me, I spent two weeks with a bunch of nuns. They have to be some of the hardest working people I’ve ever met, but even hard work doesn’t get you all the way. Sometimes you need to be lucky, or blessed (depending on who you ask) to get the job done.
If you get a chance hug a nun sometime, they can’t help you with the luck part, but I know they can help with the blessing. And if you are down by six points you might think of calling on Sister Cora, she can throw a great Hail Mary.
Matthew Pickut is a pastor in northern Indiana and a long time AFL fan. He also writes for his own website: The Brown Paper Blog. He graduated from Taylor University in Upland Indiana (class of `96) with degrees in Biblical Literature and Sociology as well as a healthy respect for the medicinal properties of coffee.
