Tulsa Talons 65 : 28 Boise Burn: Talons Roll again, Chill Burn

The Tulsa Talons returned to the field on Saturday night to face a stiffer test in the Boise Burn. Once again, the opponent was playing their season opener and there wasn't much known about the foe.

Once again, it was over by halftime.

The Talons stopped Boise defensively 4 times in the first half and cruised to a 65-28 victory of the second year Burn.

Justin Allgood (seven total TD’s – 6 pass, 1 rush) hooked up with Kellen Allen (3 TD’s total) and Jeff Hughley (4 TD’s) a total of five times in the first two quarters on seven possessions. At least three were short possessions - starting at the Boise 15 or deeper. Boise went four and out in their first possession giving the ball to Tulsa inside their own 7. Allgood hit Hughley on the first offensive play to start the scoring. Boise was shut down again in their second possession, but their defense stiffened to hold Tulsa to a 26 yard Luke Phillips field goal. Boise QB B.J. Rhode found Casey Allen open behind a coverage bust and connected for a 42 yard TD strike. Kellen Allen then took an Allgood pass, broke several tackles in re-extending Tulsa's lead back to 10.

Tulsa scored on Allgood's third TD pass of the half (a 16 yard strike to Hughley) to push the lead to 24-7. Boise then countered with Rhode finding George Williams in the back of the end zone to cut into Tulsa's lead. Williams made a great catch, then got one foot down (at least from my vantage point in section 209) then took a punishing hit from the end wall. That was as close as they would get the rest of the night. The Talons defense got rolling again and held Boise scoreless the remainder of the half. Two more Allgood TD passes (30 yards to Kellen Allen and 8 yards to Hughley) made it 37-14 (a missed PAT by Phillips is thrown in there too.) It was almost 44-14 at the half when Delenell Reid took a missed Burn FG attempt and took it all the way to the north end zone for an apparent score with the help of a couple of good blocks by CJ McLain and Aaron Chavers. Unfortunately a holding penalty on Barrett Allen negated the run and ended the half.

It was more of the same in the second half, but it was a quiet third quarter with Tulsa posing the only score on their first drive. Tulsa imposed their will offensively, moving the ball with relative ease. Delenell Reid ended a Boise drive with a great interception. On the ensuing drive, Tulsa drove all the way to the Boise 2 and looked like they had scored when Michael Shack extended the ball over the goal line where it was knocked out of his hands. The play was ruled a fumble and Boise recovered, ending that threat. The only other real blemish was a bad center-QB exchange that ended one drive. A forced pass by Allgood was intercepted by Boise, but it was negated by a defensive holding penalty.

The death blow came in the fourth quarter with about 6 minutes remaining. Allgood executed a perfect fake to Hughley the rounded the opposite corner to walk into the end zone to make it 51-14. On the ensuing kickoff the "Chaos Theory" of Arena Football was put to work. Phillips's kick clanked off the iron, and neither George Williams nor Da'Ronn Finley could cover the ball. It rolled into the top of the end zone where Jamar Ransom covered the ball for a Talons score. Another 3 feet to the left on the ensuing kickoff could of repeated the whole scene.

Boise then salvaged some pride by scoring on their last two possessions, with a short Derek Rasmussen pass to Kellen Allen - which Allen literally took away form the Burn defensive back – sandwiched in between.

The Burn was by far the best-behaved team in terms of sportsmanship I have seen in my few short years watching arena football. There were a few short tempers, but nothing really inflammatory. They played through the whistle, but not excessively after it. They even helped Tulsa players up and offered pats on the back when they could.

Mark my words now Talons fans - Boise is a good team, much better than the Amarillo team we saw last week. (Aside – Amarillo shocked Central Valley at “The Cellar” one week after the debacle in Tulsa!) If they can improve their execution on offense, and clean up their secondary play, they will hang tough out west. That’s a tough task - they are in the National Conference’s Western division, so they will see Spokane, Tri-Cities and Stockton three times each plus Central Valley twice. Out of the division, they get OKC, Florida and Texas at home and go to Daytona Beach before it gets too hot on the beaches down in Florida in May. If they can stay above .500 in their 11 divisional games, winning 2 of the remaining 4 out of division games should put them into the playoffs. Don't be surprised if we see them again in August.

Tulsa is now 2-0, heading into a Friday night "showdown" game with the Arkansas Twisters. Arkansas fell 57-42 at Oklahoma City (Tulsa's week 4 opponents in Tulsa.) I say "showdown" loosely because this isn't the same Twisters team we saw last year. Several key players are gone - QB Villanueva, DB's Varner and Pierre Thomas, WR/LB Williams... in fact, I only recognize one player on this year's roster that's a holdover from last year (WR Schnoover.)

Boise is now 0-1, and they head to Stockton to face the 1-1 Lightning who were crushed in Spokane 70-12 on Saturday night.

Go Talons!

Williesan

(from: www.af2.com)
Boise Burn 7 - 7 -- 0 - 14 = 28 Record: (0-1)
Tulsa Talons 17 - 20 -- 7 - 21 = 65 Record: (2-0)

LEADERS:
PASSING: RHODE (BOI) 19-24-1-222; 4 TDs; ALLGOOD (TUL) 21-32-0-253; 6 TDs
RECEIVING: (BOI) Williams 6-58-1; (TUL) Hughley 12-118-4

Schutt Offensive Player of the Game: Justin Allgood (TUL)
U.S. Army Ironman of the Game: Jeff Hughley (TUL)
ADT Defensive Player of the Game: Jermaine Hope (TUL)
Cutters Catch of the Game: Delenell Reid (TUL)

Attendance: 4,514

1st QUARTER:

11:33 BOI 0 - TUL 7 HUGHLEY, Jeff 12 yd pass from ALLGOOD, Justin
PHILLIPS, Luke kick, 1 play, 7 yds 0:45 Time of poss.
06:40 BOI 0 - TUL 10 PHILLIPS 26 yd field goal, 4-1 2:01
05:20 BOI 7 - TUL 10 ALLEN, Casey 42 yd pass from RHODE, B.J.
SMITH, Robby kick, 2-42 1:12
01:42 BOI 7 - TUL 17 ALLEN, Kellen 35 yd pass from ALLGOOD
PHILLIPS kick, 5-45 3:02

2nd QUARTER
12:00 BOI 7 - TUL 24 HUGHLEY 16 yd pass from ALLGOOD
PHILLIPS kick, 4-29 2:18
08:25 BOI 14 - TUL 24 WILLIAMS, George 20 yd pass from RHODE
SMITH kick, 4-45 2:56
07:26 BOI 14 - TUL 31 K. ALLEN 30 yd pass from ALLGOOD
PHILLIPS kick, 1-30 0:24
00:13 BOI 14 - TUL 37 HUGHLEY 8 yd pass from ALLGOOD
PHILLIPS kick failed, 4-21 0:38

3rd QUARTER
11:54 BOI 14 - TUL 44 HUGHLEY 10 yd pass from ALLGOOD
PHILLIPS kick, 4-47 3:06

4th QUARTER
11:50 BOI 14 - TUL 51 ALLGOOD 3 yd run
PHILLIPS kick, 3-38 2:30
10:24 BOI 14 - TUL 58 RANSOM, Jamar net recovery in end zone
PHILLIPS, Luke kick
06:07 BOI 21 - TUL 58 BRUHN, Chris 4 yd pass from RHODE
SMITH kick, 7-45 4:17
02:32 BOI 21 - TUL 65 K. ALLEN 3 yd pass from RASMUSSEN, Derek
PHILLIPS kick, 5-14 2:52
00:52 BOI 28 - TUL 65 FINLEY, DeRonn 4 yd pass from RHODE
SMITH kick, 3-37 1:06

Tulsa Talons 69 : 13 Amarillo Dusters: The Rout By Champions

(OK - this one's about a week late, but Sarah insisted I post more. ;) ... RW)

The defending af2 Arena Cup Champions returned the core of the team with 12 returning players from 2007 on the opening night roster. They also added some big additions like Jon Holland, Aaron Chavers and Barrett Allen from their divisional rivals Oklahoma City, and Kellen Allen - key receiver from the Green Bay Blizzard last year. There's also some more players waiting to get their shot like WR's Prentiss Elliott (on IR), Jarrail Jackson (currently coaching spring practice w/ Dartmouth) and Rush End C.J. McLain (his signing was announced late this week - he's waiting to come back next week, presumably because of league signing rules.) The players were raring to go according to this morning's Tulsa World article.

In short - the Talons showed up ready for a battle.

The problem is, Amarillo didn't bother to show up. OK, the team physically showed up, but they were a ghost of a team.

Tulsa had their way with the Dusters. Justin Allgood was just that for the most part: ALL GOOD. He only made one real mistake forcing a ball into Kellen Allen in the second quarter, but he had a stellar night. Kellen Allen: a great pick-up by the Talons - he had 4 TD's. Hughley looked like the same guy who was Arena Cup VII MVP scoring 2 TD's. Michael Shack (1 Rushing TD), Jermaine Landrum (1 TD Catch - from rookie Derek Rasmussen), Jermaine Hope (short KO Return for TD) and Delenell Reid (45 yard INT return for TD) also scored for Tulsa.

The Talons' defense was simply incredible. At least 4 sacks by Terrence Carter and newcomer combo Barrett Allen and Aaron Chavers. They applied constant pressure on the Dusters all night. Delenell Reid picked off two passes (taking one back 45 yards for a score just before halftime) and broke up several more passes.

Special teams were a little porous on the return coverage - a missed FG for a TD (late in the game... more on that later) and Brett Rayl's snaps were erratic (one rolled to Allgood, two others were wide, leading to missed kicks.) Luke Phillips had a solid night - 9/10 PAT's (the one miss was the result of a bad snap) and his one of his two FG misses nearly resulted in a Talons TD. I call this particular "miss" intentional because of two things: he drove the ball into the side net, and two - the first man down to the end zone for the Talons? The kicker himself. I feel that on the missed FG return for the 4th qtr. TD by Amarillo the Tulsa defenders were not giving a full effort to get down and cover the kick leading to the big return. My philosophy is to play every down like the other guys are nipping at you heels -- finish the play.

Amarillo didn't help themselves out at all. This team was - to put it mildly - an embarrassment. There was no cohesiveness to this unit at all. The play calling was average at best. And when they did get the plays right they moved the ball - but not very far. But when they didn't - it was a disaster. Fumbles. Penalties. Drops. Misteaks. Miss-takes. Mistakes all around.

Physically, Amarillo is woeful. And I don't think it's because they spend too much time at the "Big Texan" steakhouse. Their offensive linemen were small and out of shape. Several had spare tires that make me look like I'm in shape. When you looked at the two teams as they lined up across form each other, you could easily tell who was going to dominate the game.

They were fundamentally unprepared for the af2 game too. Their eligible lineman rarely, if ever reported as the eligible one before he reached the line and got set. At least once, that caused a delay of game penalty, and another time caused Amarillo to burn a timeout. You never see this in the AFL, and hardly ever in the af2 - even with the expansion teams. The coaching staff at one point was on the field before a kickoff telling a player where to line up like you would see a parent do for his kid in Pop Warner ball.

If things don't turn around quickly for the Dusters, it will be a long, long summer for their fans.

I only noticed one Talon who was dinged up - Rod Green. Looked like he got the brunt of being on the bottom of a pile after a fumble. A Duster player #30 (can't find a name from the Duster roster on their official website - no numbers listed yet) looked like he tweaked a knee or hamstring in the 4th quarter and didn't return.

Officiating - you know what? No much to complain about here. They got the illegal kick by Phillips correct - but only after a lengthy discussion tho... but they did get it correct. They did miss several obvious holds, and a shirt grab on each team although whomever from Tulsa grabbed #56's shirt for Amarillo got their money's worth.

On April 5th, Tulsa stays home to play the Boise Burn who was idle this week. Amarillo returns home to play the Central Valley Coyotes - a 55-54 winner at Bossier-Shreveport on Saturday.

Cheers!

Williesan

Line score (from www.af2.com)

SCORE BY QUARTERS: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 = FINAL
TULSA TALONS 21 -21 - 7 -20 = 69
Amarillo Dusters 0 - 0 - 6 - 7 = 13

Leaders:

Passing: Allgood (TUL) 18-27-216-6, Steele (AMR) 18-43-167-1
Receiving: Hughley (TUL) 7-115-2, K. Allen (TUL) 6-60-4; Fulton (AMR) 8-60

ADT Defensive Player of the Game: Terrance Carter (TUL)
Schutt Offensive Player of the Game: Justin Allgood (TUL)
U.S. Army Ironman: Delenell Reid (TUL)
Cutters Catch of the Game: Delenell Reid (Int. return)
Attendance: 4,502