Impressive Defense Beats The Avengers

“I’m just out there trying to help my team win,”--Omarr Smith

4/27/08
By Barbara Mason: Bay Area Sports/Raiderdrive.com

It’s always a great rivalry whenever Los Angeles comes to town, and Saturday night was no exception as the San Jose SaberCats welcomed the Los Angeles Avengers to HP Pavilion.  The SaberCats defense was apparently licking their chops from the Avengers first snap, or at least it sure looked that way as they manhandled Los Angeles forcing fumbles and pressuring both Los Angeles quarterbacks.  San Jose led from the first quarter scoring in their first series never looking back. 

At the half, quarterback Mark Grieb had completed 17 of 25 passes for 184 yards and 5 touchdowns.   Cleannord Saintil hauled in three of those passes for scores while James Roe and Rodney Wright recorded one touchdown apiece for the five strikes.  At the half San Jose was somewhat in control 39 to 23.  While that lead sounds substantial one also has to remember that this is arena football, and in the big scheme of things a 16-point lead is just not enough to insure a victory.

San Jose took care of that 16 point lead in quick order and by the time the fourth quarter clock read 5:48 left in the game San Jose had extended their lead to 70-36.  The defense recorded their 2^nd interception of the second half when Clevan Thomas picked off one of quarterback Sonny Cumbie’s passes running it back 48-yards for the score.  It just didn’t get any better for the SaberCats and as the game wore on Los Angeles seemed to self-destruct, the final score a convincing 70-42.

It was also an exceptional evening for special teams as speedster Rodney Wright who had threatened all evening on kickoff return finally broke through in the third quarter for a 56- yard romp and a touchdown. “I saw the hole open wide and tried to hit it as fast as I could,” said Wright after the game.

Although the attempt to get the ever-serious coach Darren Arbet to crack a smile failed, the performance of his team did not.  “The guys came out and played hard, they had a great week of practice.  They kept their chin up and kept pecking away at it,” said Arbet.  “Anytime you have a performance like that, you have to be happy.”  He feels that the defense has really come into their own having exceptional games two weeks in a row.  “All I know is that we are getting better and that’s all I’m concerned about right now.”  He was in total agreement that was the team’s best performance so far this year.

Defensive player of the game Omarr Smith knew coming into this game that it was going to be tough.  “We wanted to build off the win in Utah so we wanted to set the tone defensively, try to get some stops and make it a little easier on the offense,” said Smith.  “I’m just out there trying to help my team win, trying to do everything I can to be effective and make some plays.”

Quarterback Mark Grieb, the offensive player of the game, feels that the team is finally starting to play well in all phases of the game.  “The winning part is great but the way we’re playing is the biggest thing, and I think we can carry that with us in the next week.

Tonight it was a whole team effort,” Grieb said.  Not only Grieb but also the entire team knew that the 16-point half-time lead was tight.  “It was quiet in the locker room at half-time.  We all just kind of knew what we had to do and everybody remembered how things went down last time we were at home. We just wanted to come out and play the whole sixty minutes and we did,” he said.

Kicker A.J. Haglund was right on the money with three field goals, two for 35 yards and one for 18 yards as special teams more than held up their end of the deal.

While the team will enjoy this victory for a day or so, it will be back to work as they prepare for what all of them have labeled as a very tough game in Orlando.  They hope to take all that they accomplished in this game to another level making it three games in a row.  Being on the road always presents a challenge to any team, however, Orlando will have their hands full should San Jose bring what they brought Saturday, and there is no plausible reason that they won’t.  After their game against the Predators, the team will travel to Arizona for another division battle.  They will return home to HP Pavilion against the Utah Blaze on May 17^th.  Kickoff is scheduled for 7:30.