That’s it AF1 fans! The first inaugural Arena Crown will come down to the undefeated Albany Firebirds and the Number Two ranked Nashville Kats. Coming into this game the Kats and the Storm looked pretty neck and neck on paper. They split the season series. Nashville leapfrogged the Storm into that Two spot literally in the last game of the season after Salina beat SW Kansas in Week 13 and 14. (Check out our preview for a more thorough breakdown of how these two teams arrived at each other.)
Given how evenly matched they are, I was surprised that it really only felt like the Storm were in this game at the beginning and at the end. And at the end it was too late. Their fate had been decided. Their bed was made. Their third idiom meaning “it was too late” was written.
Coming out of the gate both offenses looked tight. Like they were nervous about the stakes of the game. The Storm won the toss and deferred, which may have been one of the last wise coaching decisions made by SW Kansas. In their opening drive, the Kats went four and out. Kulka completed one pass on two attempts. Their only sizable chunk of positive yardage came from a SW Kansas offsides penalty. The penalty on the Storm, although basically harmless in this possession, would be the only aspect of this drive that would turnout to be a bit prophetic.
If you were looking for one word to sum up how the Storm lost, I think it would be sloppiness. You might say carelessness, but I don’t think they’re careless. That’s not their culture. You can’t watch Jalen Morton attack a game and find anything careless.
That one penalty would be the first of three in the first quarter.
After the Storm went four and out in their first drive, the Kats scored the first touchdown of the game immediately after the Storm were whistled for a defensive holding.
At the end of the first quarter, the Kats were up 7-6 after SW Kansas’ Kicker Dillon Burkhard, who’s usually an ace, missed his first PAT attempt. Another uncharacteristic mistake.
Less than a minute into the second quarter, the Kats scored again.
13-6 Kats. This would’ve been fine. No big deal. They could exchange scores and give the AF1 fans the high scoring slug fest they’d hoped for.
After this touchdown though, the Storm would go on an almost Seven minute drive that would end with a turnover on downs. In this drive alone, they were whistled for two more holding penalties. That’s five penalties overall in just 23 minutes of game time.
Then, less than four minutes later, the Kats scored again.
Then Gunner Raborn drilled a deuce. This is peak Kats football. Capitalizing on mistakes. Minimizing your own. I guess it’s really peak all football.
The Kats were up 22-6 with about 2:30 left in the half.
To the Storm’s credit, they seemed like they might be putting it together at the end of the second through the beginning of the third. Or maybe the Kats just let up a bit? The Storm took over after Raborn’s deuce. Morton came into the drive having only thrown three complete passes out of 11 tries. They would run eight plays in this drive. Morton completed four more passes including a touchdown to Jairus Grissom.
They would also be whistled for their sixth penalty; their fifth penalty for holding. They would go into the half down 22-12 because SW Kansas opted to go for two after their second score, perhaps scared off of the PAT by Burkhard’s miss, and didn’t get it. That’s six penalties and three points left on the table in one half.
The Storm came out in the second half looking to build on their momentum. In around 90 seconds, Morton hit Demarius Washington for his second score of the night and brought the deficit to under a touchdown at 22-18.
Burkhard hit this PAT and brought them within three. 22-19. This is as close as the Storm would get for the rest of the game.
The Kats would answer on the second play of their next possession.
29-19 Kats. Nashville had found their rhythm. Maybe the Storm had found theirs too?
The Storm took over with 10:45 left in the third. This drive is in contention for their sloppiest of the game. If this were talk radio, we might call this the most costly drive of the season.
It started fine. They were moving the ball well. They had already gotten a couple of first downs. After Morton completed a pretty spectacular pass to a diving Charles Hall IV for another first down, the Storm started running into issues.
The Kats defense was ready. The play clock was ticking. The Storm offense was at the line but clearly not certain of the play. Players looked to the sideline and raised their hands to signal confusion. The play clock was ticking. The Coaches’ eyes were wide and they shouted in frustration. Something had gone wrong communicating the play call.
The Storm called timeout. There was 6:40 left in the third and they had two more timeouts for the rest of the game.
Out of the timeout, the Storm ran three straight unsuccessful plays. It was now Fourth down and goal. There was 4:40 left in the third and Coach Gary Thomas called ANOTHER timeout.
This drive, which took six minutes and cost them two timeouts, ended in a Dillon Burkhard field goal. 29-22 Kats. The Storm had a single timeout left for the rest of this semi-final matchup.
The Storm did escape the third quarter without any penalties. They unfortunately made up for that in the final quarter. They were flagged for five penalties in the fourth to bring their total for the game to 11, which cost them around 73 yards. That’s almost one and a half Arena football fields worth of penalties.
Despite the accumulation of laundry on the field, the Storm kept pace with the Kats. They exchanged touchdowns for the entirety of the fourth quarter. Back and Forth they went. The Storm were going to have to force the Kats into a mistake to break the cycle.
Morton hit Charles Hall IV for another touchdown:
The Kats took over with 52 seconds left and a 48-42 lead. They had to make it 52 seconds. Normally, you’d just run out the clock right? Not in the AF1.
As you no doubt know, in the AF1 if a team is leading by less than 35 (or 25. I couldn’t find the specific number anywhere), they are required to make forward progress during the Final Minute of play. They can’t kneel and let the clock run. This turns the end of AF1 games into chess with Coaches carefully calculating their playcalls, defenses and timeouts so that their team is given the best possible chance to get the ball back.
Unfortunately for the Storm, their Coach had only left them with one timeout to stop the clock, and the Kats’ fullback Calvin Fance was having an incredibly efficient game. Fance, who’s typically only used for short yardage, only had four carries for six yards tonight, but it’s all he needed. He had two touchdowns and allowed the Kats to run out the clock and seal the victory.
That’s actually not entirely true. With six seconds left, the Storm were whistled for a defensive offsides. The penalty stopped the clock, BUT in order to prevent teams who’ve run out of timeouts from using penalties to gain more time, the AF1 implements a 10 second runoff. Which in this case, ended the game.
The Kats are going to Albany.
The Storm had a great season, but in doing research for this final recap, it was impossible not to notice that they’d just lost three games in a row by less than a touchdown. That prompted me to do a little more simple math.
DID YOU KNOW: In this, the debut AF1 season, there were 11 games decided by six points or less. The SW Kansas Storm were in six of them. They lost five of them.
What does it mean when a team can win close games?
Let’s take a more focused look at some key performances in this game.
These Kats Have Claws
Kulkamania continued his incredibly efficient and crowd pleasing run against the Storm. He went 18-21 for 250 yards and FIVE touchdown passes.
Nih-Jer Jackson had only six catches on the day but he made them count. He totaled up 131 yards and two touchdowns.
Gunner Raborn had a nice return to form game. He’s been struggling the last few weeks since coming back from injury but Raborn stepped up for the Kats in the clutch. He went 5-7 in PAT’s and had one deuce giving him seven of the Kats 48 points.
The Storm has Passed
MVP Finalist Jalen Morton put up numbers that only an MVP could. He went 20-37 for 296 yards and threw six touchdowns.
Morton also tacked on 27 rushing yards to his stat line in only three carries.
Morton’s favorite target of the night was Wide Receiver Charles Hall IV who had nine catches for 145 yards and two touchdowns.
Demarius Washington caught eight passes for 119 yards for three touchdowns of his own.
That’s it from Nashville. The Kats will now rest and ready themselves for the undefeated Firebirds in the first ever ARENA CROWN. Kickoff is in Albany on Saturday, June 28 at 1:00pm Eastern Time.
You can catch all of the AF1 action on ViceTV.
