Phantoms Game Notes
May 6, 2002 - Arena Football League (1987-2008) (AFL I)
Toronto Phantoms News Release
QUICK FACTS:
Toronto Phantoms (2-1) vs. Indiana Firebirds (2-1)
Date: Thursday, May 9th
Kickoff: 7:00 PM EST
Site: Air Canada Centre (17,100)
Officials: Bill Athan (Referee), Rick Nelson (Umpire), Tim Podroza (Head Linesman), Art Lucky (Line Judge), Greg Steed (Back Judge)
Series Record: 1-0 Indiana Last Meeting: Indiana 45 Toronto 34 â June 8, 2001
Streaks: Toronto lost its most recent game; Indiana has won 2 straight
Coaches: Toronto - Mark Stoute (10-7, 2nd year); Indiana â Mike Dailey (47-26, 6th year)
THE STAKES: This game features a pair of 2-1 teams each holding on to a share of 1st place in their respective divisions. Toronto lost its most recent game in Arizona to fall into a tie atop the Eastern Division with the New Jersey Gladiators. Indiana meanwhile has won its last two straight to share top spot in the Central Division with Chicago
THE SERIES: Indiana won the first, and only, meeting between the clubs topping Toronto 45-34 in a game held at Air Canada Centre on June 8, 2001.
THE IFs:
If Toronto defeats Indiana, it would ...
· Give Toronto a 3-1 record overall
· Give Toronto a 2-0 home record in 2002
· Give Toronto its 4th consecutive regular season win at Air Canada Centre (dating back to last season)
HEAD COACHES: Toronto's Mark Stoute is spending his 2nd season as the Head Coach & General Manager of the Toronto Phantoms, after serving as an assistant in the AFL for the previous 6 years. In his first year at the helm, Stoute led the Phantoms to an 8-6 regular season record, an Eastern Division Championship and a playoff victory. Indiana's Mike Dailey won the 1999 AFL Coach of the Year Award in leading the Firebirds franchise (at the time, located in Albany) to a win in the Arena Bowl. Under his direction, the Firebirds have made the playoffs in 4 of the past 5 seasons.
2002 IN REVIEW: The Toronto Phantoms have posted a 2-1 record to launch 2002, recording lopsided wins over Tampa Bay and Detroit, before falling to the Arizona Rattlers in Phoenix The Phantoms kicked off the new season with a 51-37 win over Tampa Bay (4/20). Chad Salisbury threw for 4 scores to earn MVP honours. Ty Law was named as the Ironman after hauling in two of those scoring strikes and making an interception to kill a 4th quarter Tampa Bay rally. Steve Konopka set a new Phantoms single game high with 3 sacks. On the last of those 3 sacks, Konopka knocked Tampa quarterback John Kaleo out of the game with what was later revealed to be a season-ending knee injury.
On Thursday, April 25th, Toronto staged its home opener in front of 7,107 phans at Air Canada Centre. The Phantoms made good on their President's guarantee, rolling the Detroit Fury 50-30. Team President & CEO Rob Godfrey had guaranteed a win to the phans of Toronto â a guarantee backed by the promise of a free ticket to another Phantoms home game, in the event of a Phantoms loss. Salisbury was brilliant on "Guaranteed Win Night" throwing for 5 touchdowns without an interception. The Toronto QB was named as the MVP for the 2nd consecutive week, while Charlie Davidson earned Ironman honours. Davidson made a pair of touchdown catches and led his team with 4½ total tackles.
The Phantoms 7 game regular season winning streak was snapped in a 58-47 road loss in Phoenix (5/4). Sherdrick Bonner threw for 362 yards and 7 touchdowns earning MVP honours in leading Arizona past Toronto. The Ironman of the game, WR/DB Chris Horn, caught two of those touchdown passes. Damian Harrell, Kerry Brown and Anthony Derricks all turned in strong individual showings in the loss. Harrell and Brown each scored a pair of touchdowns, while Derricks recorded 214 kickoff return yards taking one kick back 56 yards for a score.
2001 IN REVIEW: In the team's inaugural season in Toronto, the Phantoms posted a record of 8-6 capturing the Eastern Division championship. The Phantoms won just 3 times in the club's first 9 games, but rallied to win the final 5 games on the regular season schedule surging to the top of the division.
Toronto emerged a winner in the first playoff game in team history, defeating the New York Dragons 64-57 on July 27, 2001. Toronto thus completed a unique 4-game sweep of the Dragons having won 1 preseason game, 2 regular season games and 1 post-season game with New York.
The Phantoms 2001 campaign came to a disappointing end on August 3 in Nashville. The hometown Kats scored a touchdown with 1 second remaining in regulation time to defeat the Phantoms 45-38.
Charlie Davidson enjoyed a most successful season in 2001, being named as a 2nd Team All-Arena WR / DB. The team captain missed 5 games due to injury during the season. In his absence the Phantoms struggled with a 1-4 record. Toronto was 7-2 in the games in which Davidson appeared. Anthony Derricks further confirmed his status as one of the league's most dangerous kick return specialists racking up 1606 kick return yards. Derricks finished in the AFL's top 10 in all-purpose yardage, interceptions, passes defended, tackles and fumbles recovered.
Damian Harrell emerged as the unquestioned leader of the Phantoms' receiving corps. Harrell scored a team-high 20 touchdowns and finished among the league leaders in receiving yards and receiving yards per game.
2001 MEETING: (6/8/01 â Toronto, Ontario) - Eddie Brown made a pair of touchdown receptions and threw for the game-winning score as the Indiana Firebirds beat the Toronto Phantoms 45-34. Brown was on the receiving end of 17 and 40 yard scoring strikes from game MVP Raymond Philyaw before completing his only passing attempt of the game finding Van Johnson 2 yards away in the end zone.
Greg Hopkins was named as the Ironman after leading all Indiana receivers with 7 receptions covering 61 yards.
The Phantoms, losers of 3 straight games, were led by Ty Law who made 7 catches for 83 yards and 2 scores. Law also completed a scoring pass to Kerry Brown in the 2nd quarter.
Score by Quarters 1 2 3 4 Score
Indiana Firebirds 14 10 14 7 45
Toronto Phantoms 7 14 7 6 34
FAMILIAR FACES: Indiana WR/LB Gary Compton emerged as one of the top two-way threats in the game while playing for Rick Frazier in Milwaukee. Frazier, now the Assistant Head Coach & Defensive Coordinator for the Phantoms, had previously served as the Head Coach in Milwaukee for 4 seasons. Compton won the 2001 Built Ford Tough Man of the Year Award while playing alongside the likes of Phantoms OL/DL Doug Lytle and WR/DB Kahlil Carter, both former Mustangs.
Toronto's OL/DL John Summerday won an Arena Bowl championship ring with the Firebirds in his rookie season (1999). Unfortunately, John will miss this game with his former team â he's stuck on IR with a sprained knee.
THIS WEEK'S QUOTES:
"We just lost this game all on our own. It wasn't that Arizona beat us â we beat ourselves with mental mistakes." Phantoms Offensive Specialist Damian Harrell on the loss to the Arizona Rattlers. Harrell made 7 catches for 115 yards and 2 touchdowns in the loss.
"This week, we are going to see what type of team we have here and whether we can bounce back after a loss like that. I think you'll see a team on Thursday that is physically and mentally ready to play." Harrell's response when asked about how the loss in Phoenix will shape the Phantoms' preparations for Thursday's game with Indiana.
"Let me ask you this -- is it really possible to go 14-0? No, probably not. But we're going to continue to win a lot more games than we lose. It's up to all of us now to reload and go back out there and do the job." WR/LB Kerry Brown speaking after the loss to the Rattlers. Brown sparkled in his 2002 debut making a pair of touchdown catches in the 3rd quarter.
"I was a little rusty out there â I still have to get my wind back to be in game shape. Don't get me wrong -- I'm happy to be back but you can never really be happy about any individual stats when you're not enjoying success over all as a team." Brown on his return to the Phantoms lineup after spending the first two weeks of the regular season on injured reserve. Brown had been sidelined with a severely bruised sternum after getting kicked in the chest during a preseason game with Grand Rapids.
"I've got give all the credit to the guys out in front of me. I was getting the blocks and when I get the blocks I can do my thing." Phantoms kick return specialist Anthony Derricks on his performance on special teams in Phoenix. Derricks, who struggled in Weeks One & Two, broke out with 214 kick return yards on just 7 kicks. "A-D" ran a kick back in the 2nd quarter â a return that covered 56 yards.
TORONTO PHANTOMS LAST WEEK: (5/4/02 â Phoenix, Arizona) "We just lost this game all on our own. It wasn't that Arizona beat us â we beat ourselves with mental mistakes." That was the post-game assessment of Toronto offensive specialist Damian Harrell after his Phantoms fell to the Arizona Rattlers 58-47. It's the first loss for Toronto in 2002 and the team's first loss in regular season play since June 8, 2001 â a span covering 7 regular season games.
Among the mistakes that Harrell is referring to you can count the following; 1) 3 interceptions, 2) 1 fumble recovered by the opposition, 3) 3 missed PAT attempts, 4) a pair of botched 2-point conversion attempts and 5) 11 penalties totaling 86 yards.
Toronto stumbled badly to begin this game, perhaps setting the tone for the night. On the team's first possession, Chad Salisbury threw a pair of incomplete passes before unloading his first interception of the season and the first of 3 on the night all recovered by Arizona's Jerrick Bledsoe. Phantoms Coach Mark Stoute is familiar with Bledsoe â Stoute was an assistant coach with the Florida Bobcats when Bledsoe first broke into the league. Says Stoute, "[Bledsoe] just played a great game for them. I had him down in Florida and didn't think he could do things like that, but he came to play tonight."
On the Phantoms next possession, Salisbury was smacked by Wendall Gaines and fumbled the ball away. The Rattlers recovered and two plays later Maurice Bryant was celebrating in the end zone after hauling in a 32-yard touchdown pass from Sherdrick Bonner. The Rattlers led 14-0 just over 7 minutes in to the game. Bonner would finish the night with 7 touchdown passes, completing 29 passes for 362 yards. Not surprisingly, he was selected as the MVP.
Salisbury seemed to settle down in the 2nd quarter and helped Toronto cut the Arizona deficit to just 2 points by the halftime break. The Phantoms QB spotted Harrell with a pair of scoring passes during the quarter, one covering 34 yards, the other covering 20 yards. Harrell finished the night as the game's leading receiver with 7 receptions for 115 yards and 2 touchdowns. It marks the second straight week, Harrell has eclipsed the 100-yard receiving mark. But that was small consolation to Toronto's star receiver. "The numbers and stuff like that just don't matter after a game like this", he says. "The only thing that matters and counts is the Ws, and we didn't get the W tonight."
Harrell's play was one bright spot for Toronto â Kerry Brown and Anthony Derricks also provided strong individual showings in the losing cause. Brown, a WR/LB who had just been activated from injured reserve the day before the game, sparkled in the 3rd quarter, hauling in a pair of TD passes.
The second of those 2 touchdowns gave Toronto its first and only lead of the night. With 2:20 remaining in the quarter, Brown took a short pass along the sideboards, slipped one tackle and ran 40 yards to the end zone behind a block from Harrell.
Says Brown, who had been out since Week One of the preseason with a bruised sternum, "I'm happy to be back but you can never really be happy about any individual stats when you're not enjoying success over all as a team."
Derricks finally started flashing the form that made him one of the most dangerous kick return specialists in the AFL over the past two seasons. "A-D" piled up 214 kickoff return yards, breaking one of his seven returns off for a 56-yard touchdown during the 2nd quarter. "The hole was there", says Derricks. "So I just shot into it and tried a spin move, and the spin move worked. Basically, I just picked my hole and went for it." In one game, Derricks very nearly doubled his kick return yards from the Phantoms previous two games combined (115).
In spite of the best efforts of that trio, Toronto came up short in the final frame, going scoreless in the 4th quarter. Arizona meanwhile got a pair of touchdown receptions from Ironman honouree Chris Horn to turn a 2 point shortfall into an 11 point win. Horn led the Rattlers with 7 catches for 97 yards and the 2 scores â he also registered a team-high 4 ½ tackles on the defensive side of the ball. Maurice Bryant also caught 7 balls for Arizona taking 3 to the end-zone to lead all scorers on the night.
Toronto's record now sits at 2-1. The Phantoms will now get set to play host to another 2-1 team, the Indiana Firebirds. Says Harrell, " This week, we are going to see what type of team we have here and whether we can bounce back after a loss like that. I think you'll see a team on Thursday that is physically and mentally ready to play."
When asked about this loss and how it might affect the Phantoms as they prepare for the Firebirds, Brown answered with a question of his own. "Let me ask you this", he says. "Is it really possible to go 14-0? No, probably not. But we're going to continue to win a lot more games than we lose. It's up to all of us now to reload and go back out there and do the job."
Tickets for the May 9th meeting between the Toronto Phantoms and the Indiana Firebirds at Air Canada Centre (7 PM kickoff) are now on sale and can be purchased by calling (416) 341-1234 or by logging on to torontophantoms.com. Get "Insane for the Game" and be a part of "Thursday Night Gridiron Madness
TORONTO PHANTOMS NEXT WEEK: On Saturday, May 18th Toronto will play its first game of the season against a divisional opponent, tackling the Destroyers in Buffalo. In 2001, Toronto lost just one game within its division in clinching the division title â that loss came to Buffalo in Week One, in the first Arena Football League game ever played in Air Canada Centre. Toronto gained a measure of revenge later in the season, defeating the Destroyers 61-26 in Buffalo. Next week's game will be broadcast on Rogers Sportsnet and can be heard on MOJO AM 640. Kickoff is set for 7 PM.
TEAM NOTES/TRENDS:
KONO CAPTURES MONTHLY HONOURS: Toronto OL/DL Steve Konopka was named as the Arena Football League's Defensive Player of the Month for April. Konopka set a team and personal high recording 3 sacks in the Week One win over Tampa Bay. Heading to Week Four, Konopka remains entrenched in the league's top ten in sacks, fumbles forced and tackles for a loss.
2ND TO NONE IN THE 2ND QUARTER: In an interesting twist, Toronto has dominated the opposition in the 2nd quarter of games played this season, as demonstrated in the following table.
Points For:
QTR. TORONTO OPPOSITION
1 27 34
2 69 34
3 35 29
4 17 28
Totals 148 125
Toronto has outscored its opponents by a 2-1 margin during the 2nd quarter, racking up nearly half of its total points for during that 15 minute frame.
FOLDING IN THE 4TH: In the loss to Arizona, Toronto was held scoreless in the 4th quarter. That marked the first time this season and just the 3rd time in Phantoms history that the team had been shut out in a quarter.
It's interesting to note that Toronto has never been shut out for an entire quarter at home.
50 IS THE MAGIC NUMBER: The Toronto Phantoms have enjoyed remarkable success when the club eclipses the 50 point plateau in a game. The Phantoms have scored 50 or more points in 10 of the team's 17 regular season games â Toronto has won all but one of those games. However, when the Phantoms score less than 50, the team's won-loss record stands at just 1-6. JERSEY PICKS UP POINTER: Under the rules of the Arena Football League, teams can freely sign members of opposing practice squads. Such was the unfortunate case recently when the New Jersey Gladiators made a bid to acquire the services of WR/DB Chris Pointer from Toronto. Pointer was awarded to New Jersey on April 30th. Says Phantoms Head Coach & General Manager Mark Stoute, "We are very sorry to lose a fine young man like Chris, but we're happy that he's going to get a shot at some playing-time in New Jersey. He's a very capable player who impressed the coaching staff here in Toronto and obviously in New Jersey as well."
THE POLLS ARE IN!: The Toronto Phantoms figured prominently in a pair of recent polls conducted by the AFL's official website, arenafootball.com.
"Which team do you think will win the Eastern Division this year?"
Toronto Phantoms â 34%
New Jersey Gladiators â 24%
New York Dragons â 22%
Buffalo Destroyers â 20%
"Who is the most unappreciated quarterback in the AFL?"
Chad Salisbury (Toronto) â 23%
Kevin McDougal (Georgia) â 16%
Raymond Philyaw (Indiana) â 16%
Billy Dicken (Chicago) â 15%
Tony Graziani (LA) â 14%
Other â 17%
PLAYERS/MATCHUPS TO WATCH:
Phantoms QB Chad Salisbury vs. the Firebirds "D": Salisbury struggled badly in the loss to the Rattlers, throwing 3 interceptions and fumbling once. It will be interesting to see how he responds against a team in Indiana that has produced a league-high 8 interceptions.
Indiana QB Raymond Philyaw vs. the Phantoms "D": Philyaw was selected as the MVP when Indiana rolled over Toronto in last year's meeting. However, this time around he'll be faced with the league's top defence. Toronto has surrendered a league-low 125 points â an average of 41.7 points per game. Indiana ranks 2nd in that category giving up an average of 45.0 points per game.
Brown & Law vs. Compton: This game might be won in the middle of the field as each team boasts outstanding talent at the WR/LB position. Toronto's Kerry Brown made an impressive return from injured reserve last week hauling in 3 passes for 70 yards, scoring twice. In his absence, Ty Law prospered in a starting role producing 3 touchdowns and 2 interceptions over the first two weeks of the season. Compton is an outstanding two-way threat who was honoured as the winner of the 2001 Built Ford Tough Man of the Year Award.
Toronto K Matt George vs. Indiana K Nelson Garner: "K-12" struggled in the loss to the Rattlers missing badly on each of his first 3 PAT attempts and only hitting on 1 of his 2 FG attempts. He will have to be sure-footed if the Phantoms hope to get their kicks against a strong Indiana team. Garner will have to be wary on his kickoffs of the threat posed by Anthony Derricks who finally broke out of his own personal slump last week.
KEY DATES IN TORONTO PHANTOMS HISTORY:
May 5, 2001 The Phantoms fall to 0-2 at Air Canada Centre losing 62-45 to the visiting Grand Rapids Rampage. Quarterback Clint Dolezel threw for 6 touchdowns and rushed another in himself in the Rampage win.
May 12, 2001 Toronto suffers its first loss on the road, getting thumped by the Tampa Bay Storm. Toronto gives up a season-high 70 points in the loss (70-33).
May 19, 2001 Ty Law and Anthony Derricks lead Toronto to the first home win in franchise history, as the Phantoms lasso the Oklahoma Wranglers 72-38. Law sets team records with 5 touchdown receptions, 30 points scored and 154 yards receiving. Derricks, meanwhile, registers 219 kickoff return yards taking two kicks all the way back for scores.
Arena Football League (1987-2008) Stories from May 6, 2002
- Rampage Game Notes - Grand Rapids Rampage
- Cobras Game Notes - Carolina Cobras
- Phantoms Game Notes - Toronto Phantoms
- Week Three Game Recaps - AFL I
- Lamont Cooper breaks seven team records - Buffalo Destroyers
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