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Phantoms Rattled by Mistakes

May 5, 2002 - Arena Football League (1987-2008) (AFL I)
Toronto Phantoms News Release


Phoenix, AZ: "We just lost this game all on our own. It wasn't that Arizona beat us – 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 – a span covering 7 regular season games.

AFL - Week 3
Toronto Phantoms 47
Arizona Rattlers 58

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 – 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 – 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 – 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 Girdiron Madness"!



Arena Football League (1987-2008) Stories from May 5, 2002


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