Knights Try not to Let Down against Wardogs
Keith Murphy
Friday June 7, 2002
Porter says that even at 2-6 this is a big game for Columbus, “You know, when you’re down like they’ve been, you’re just fighting to be noticed -- to show that you deserve some kind of recognition for all the work that you’re doing. They’re working hard over there but it hasn’t translated into wins for them. They’re a dangerous team. They’ve got a good football team but we feel it is a team we should beat.”
Knights’ Offensive Coordinator Tres Sullivan doesn’t think his squad will overlook this dangerous Columbus team, “We continue to reiterate to our players that, in order to continue on the path that we want to take, we have to play our best each and every week regardless of who our opponent is. I think they’ve got a good understanding of that. We’ve been able to approach each game as an important game and I suspect they’ll do that this week. The guys have been real professional in understanding what we are trying to do and I don’t see them straying from that path this week.” Nor does Porter foresee a letdown, “We’ve talked about what we are trying to accomplish and how just one game can spoil what we’re trying to do. Our guys realize that Columbus is not a bad team. Columbus might be the best 2-6 team in the league.”
The Knights’ offense has flexed its muscle of late and, as a result, have begun to climb up the statistical charts. Macon leads the league in scoring and is ranked fourth in scoring offense. Sullivan believes that the offensive production is the result of the receivers becoming comfortable with his offensive schemes and with Quarterback John Rayborn, “The receivers are starting to feel a lot more comfortable since we’ve been doing this for the last 9 or 10 weeks. They’re starting to feel comfortable in the offense. I don’t think they’re thinking as much as they did before; they’re just going out and reacting and that’s allowed them to make a bunch of different plays. John’s been a lot more comfortable with the receivers and what we’re doing offensively. This is a testament to those guys and it shows the progress that they’ve made. Each week we’ve gotten better and built up stats on offense.”
The one game that the Knights’ offense seemed to stumble was two weeks ago against these same Wardogs. “We were stopped three times in that game.” Sullivan explained, “Twice we were stopped on downs. I don’t think it was as much what they did as we stopped ourselves. We had chances on all of those drives, but we missed open receivers.” Sullivan expects the Wardogs to approach this week’s game with a similar game plan, “I suspect they’ll play the same was as they did have a little success against us. But I still think it was us stopping ourselves.”
On the other side of the ball, the Knights are still hanging back with the middle of the pack in most defensive categories and are ranked 30th out of 32 teams in total defense. Porter says that those statistics are a bit deceiving. “In my opinion, the only real important defensive stats are scoring defense and turnover margin and we’ve done a pretty good job of turning the ball over. We’ve played good defense, stopping teams, when it counted. You also need to take into account that we haven’t played anybody who has been soft on offense.” He also pointed out that most of the teams the Knights have faced so far this season have been offensive heavyweights.
This week the Knights upgraded their receiving corps with the addition of WR/DB Norman Mason. Mason, who played his college ball at the University of Kentucky, was the “player to be named later” in the deal that sent Quarterback Mike Gluski to Cape Fear. Mason was the Wildcats’ top scorer and enhances the already potent Knights’ offensive weaponry. “He [Siegfried] owed us a player,” Porter explained referring to the Gluski deal, “He [Mason] was a player that he felt he could move and still be competitive. We talked about it, after we traded Mike [Gluski], that we would have to get a good player and when he said that Mason might be available I didn’t have a problem taking him as he’s a great player.”
Sullivan believes that once Mason picks up the Knights’ offensive terminology he will fit right in. Sullivan says that Mason may see action as early as Saturday, “Possibly. We don’t want to put him in a position where he has to do a lot of thinking. If he doesn’t have a good understanding of what we’re doing on offense and defense, then we might sit him down for a week. I think it depends on how he does the next couple of days. Hopefully, if he progresses like we think he can we’ll get him some playing time on Saturday.” Sullivan says that he was a bit surprised that Cape Fear Coach Chris Siegfried let a player of Mason’s caliber get away, “I knew that Chris was hurting for lineman and for FB/LBs. He lost a couple this past weekend. So knew he needed some big guys up front and he probably felt that in order to get some quality players up front he needed to let go of one of his best players.”
Kickoff is set for 7:30 at the Macon Coliseum. This game is “kid’s night” and the team is soliciting donations of diapers, baby formula, food, or monetary donations for a local children’s charity.
Dr. Murphy has nearly 20 years of media experience ranging from radio to the Internet. He has served as webmaster for two AF2 teams and the football team at Fort Valley State University. He is a professor at FVSU and directs www.bunniwerks.org, a non-profit rabbit rescue organization. He has been commissioned as a Kentucky Colonel. Murphy is also serving as a first party editor of af2 stories for ArenaFfan. For more information about Dr. Murphy see: www.keithmurphy.info