Muskegon Thunder's Scott Greene named IFL Player of Week

May 6, 2009 - Indoor Football League (IFL)
Muskegon Thunder News Release


Muskegon - Kicking has always been an Achilles' heel for the Muskegon Thunder. On Friday night, they turned that weakness into a Herculean strength as rookie Scott Greene booted seven field goals in a 34-26 Indoor Football League victory over the visiting Saginaw Sting.

Greene hit 7-of-8 field goal attempts on the night along with an extra point to score 22 points and give Muskegon its first ever IFL win. Greene had makes of 38, 22, 37, 38, 17, 31 and 18 yards. His only miss came on a 54-yarder he intentionally kicked out of play to avoid having a kick blocked deep in Thunder territory. The seven successful three-pointers in one game is an IFL record.

For his efforts, Greene has been named the Indoor Football League's Special Teams Player of the Week for Week 8. He is the first Thunder player to be recognized for an individual league award this season and is the second kicker to claim the honor. The other kicker was Parker Douglass of Sioux Falls in Week 5. Greene and Douglass will show off their skills when the two teams meet this Saturday night at Sioux Falls Arena.

During Muskegon's inaugural season in 2007, the team failed to convert a single field goal, losing four games by six points or less. Last year, the situation improved slightly, but crucial missed kicks led to another 4 losses in crunch time.

Enter Greene, a recent graduate of Grand Valley State University that connected on 31-of-44 field goal attempts over his final two seasons with the Lakers, leading the team in scoring during his junior and senior years. But outdoor success, where goal posts are 18-feet-6-inches wide and the only obstructions are leaping opponents, has little impact indoors, where the spread between uprights is only 10 feet and ceiling girders and scoreboards act as additional defenders.

Muskegon's L.C. Walker Arena, built in 1960 as a home for professional ice hockey, is one of the toughest places to kick indoors in the 19-team IFL. Low-hanging steel beams and flood lights along with a large center scoreboard wreak havoc with a kicker's confidence.

"The building is the biggest thing affecting how I kick," said Greene, who has played five of his seven games this year at home. "It's like they have another person out there to block the kick."

It doesn't take long for visiting kickers to notice the challenging conditions as pregame warm-ups begin.

"It's always a point of conversation with the opposing kickers," added Greene, who doesn't get to practice at Walker Arena during the week because the facility's other tenant, the Muskegon Lumberjacks hockey team, is still competing. "They'll say, ‘What am I supposed to do with this?'"

It would be tempting to scrap everything learned while kicking outdoors, but Greene says that's not the case at all.

"I'm trying not to change my mechanics," he continued. "It's a fight with your own body and what you've been taught.

It's about doing the same thing over and over. Going through the checklist in my mind before each kick and executing."

Greene struggled early on to adjust to the nuances of indoor kicking, missing his first 13 attempts this season. Since then, he has made 11 of his last 24 tries, including a franchise-best 46-yarder at Rochester's Blue Cross Arena, which helped the team avoid being shutout for the first time in the their 33-game history.

The 6-foot-2, 210-pound Hartland, Michigan native never envisioned himself kicking footballs professionally, indoors or outdoors, during his prep days at Hartland High School. It wasn't for a lack of success on the gridiron, however, where Greene garnered All-State honors for a senior year that included 11-of-12 precision on three-pointers.

Rather, it was soccer that had Greene's utmost attention and eventually landed him a scholarship to the University of Illinois at Chicago. As a freshman goaltender for the Flames, he posted a stingy 1.2 goals against average.

But after transferring to GVSU, Greene found himself back on the football field and the solid form returned.

Greene has never shook the soccer bug, however, as he currently serves as the goalkeeper coach at Grand Rapids Kenowa Hills High School for both the Knights' boys and girls soccer teams. He is also a substitute teacher for Kenowa Hills, Rockford and the Grand Rapids Public School system.

Greene is feeling less like a fill-in and more like a regular member of the Thunder these days. Winning an award won't go to Greene's head, though. He knows you are only as good as your last kick.

"The week before (versus Maryland at home) I was 0-for-5," admitted Green, whose shortest attempt that night was from 32 yards out. "The biggest thing now is consistency. Keeping it down and keeping it straight."

It'll take a lot more than tough kicking conditions to keep Greene down as he prepares for the second half of his indoor rookie campaign.



Indoor Football League Stories from May 6, 2009


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