Silverbacks Snap 17-Game Losing Streak
April 20, 2010 - Continental Indoor Football League (CIFL)
Dayton Silverbacks News Release
A new quarterback resulted in a new result for the Miami Valley Silverbacks Saturday night at the Odeum Sports Complex in Villa Park, Ill. outside of Chicago, as Keynes Mincy led the Silverbacks to a 46-29 win, ending a 17-game losing streak that dates back to a 35-29 win against the Fort Wayne Freedom on May 2, 2008.
"I'd like to thank God for everything," said Mincy. "It feels good to get something in that win column, because we've been struggling for a long time."
Mincy, who played receiver for the Silverbacks in their first three games this season, accounted for seven touchdowns, five passing and two rushing, in his first game as a quarterback for the team.
Saturday, Mincy completed eight of 16 passes for 155 yards and one interception, also rushing eight times for 77 yards to lead the team.
The switch to Mincy, Miami Valley's third starting quarterback in four games, got off to a shaky start, as he was sacked on his first play, and lost a fumble on his second that Chicago recovered at the Miami Valley 12.
The Silverbacks defense held, however, and Mincy showed what he could do with his first pass, a 43-yard touchdown strike to Daniel Stover.
"At first I didn't know he caught it, because I got hit on the play," Mincy said. "But I saw him still running with the ball and (running back Derrick) Moss picked me up and said 'It's a TD!' "
Will Ducey, who started for Chicago because Ron Ricciardi was in the hospital with an infected cyst, immediately answered with a 36-yard touchdown to Brandon Wogoman, but the Silverbacks defense held the Cardinals scoreless the rest of the first half.
Meanwhile, Mincy and Stover hooked up for a six-yard touchdown to make the score 12-6 by the end of the first quarter, and Mincy ran for two touchdowns to expand that lead to 24-6 by halftime.
"We knew they couldn't cover Stover one-on-one," said Miami Valley head coach Brian Wells. "We tried to isolate their coverage on Stover and that opened up other things. If everybody was covered, Keynes is still dangerous with the ball in his hands."
Mincy's first touchdown run came after Miami Valley faced a third-and-14 from its own 22. Mincy scrambled for 11 yards on third down and ran in a 17-yard touchdown on fourth down. On Miami Valley's next possession, Mincy scored on a 19-yard touchdown run.
"That's my triple threat," Mincy said. "Most people don't think I can run, but I can run with the best of them."
Chicago adjusted to contain Mincy's running ability in the second half, enabling the Cardinals to twice pull within 10 points.
Phil Taylor's 6-yard touchdown run and a two-point conversion run by Wogoman made it 24-14. A 30-yard score from Mincy to Stover and a two-point pass to Adell Givens made it 32-14, but Chicago responded with a 34-yard touchdown pass from Ducey to Alex Nunez and another two-point conversion by Wogoman to make it 32-22.
A blocked field goal gave Chicago the ball at the Miami Valley 9-yard line towards the end of the third quarter, putting the Silverbacks hopes of ending their losing streak in jeopardy.
"My thought was, here we go," said Wells. "We still had a whole quarter to play. We had to stay focused on finishing out."
Will White and Derrick Crawford helped Miami Valley finish out the win, stopping the Cardinals for a loss on two of the next four plays to turn the ball over on downs.
White led the defense with four tackles, three-and-a-half for a loss, and a sack. Chris Stanford added three-and-a-half tackles, one tackle for loss, a sack, an interception, and a pass breakup. Crawford had one-and-a-half tackles and a quarterback hurry.
As a unit, the defense held Chicago to minus-eight rushing yards on nine attempts despite the return of running back Phil Taylor to the Chicago lineup.
An interception gave Chicago another chance to pull to within single-digits, but a touchdown pass from Ducey to Shawn McKeown was called back for holding, and a short completion followed by three incompletions gave the ball back to the Silverbacks.
By then, the Silverbacks had been able to adjust to Chicago's halftime change of defense, and Mincy found Stover for a 26-yard touchdown, Stover's fourth score of the night.
"He ran a lot of good routes and our offense is designed for the 'Y' (receiver) to get a lot of good routes," Mincy said of Stover, who had 105 receiving yards with all four of his catches going for touchdowns.
Mincy's fifth touchdown of the game was a 23-yard score to Melvin Bryant that put Miami Valley ahead, 46-22, with 46 seconds remaining.
Chicago scored the game's final touchdown on a 20-yard pass from Ducey to McKeown with 29 seconds remaining, and Julie Harshbarger closed out the scoring with an extra point, making her the second female to score in a CIFL game this season.
"She was pretty good and after the game I took my daughters up to meet her and my oldest daughter got her autograph," Wells said.
Meanwhile, Mincy's thoughts were already to next week's rematch against the undefeated Cincinnati Commandos, who handed Miami Valley a 53-26 loss in the opening game of the CIFL season on March 13.
"I actually Facebooked (before Saturday's game) that we needed this 'W' going into this game next week," Mincy said. "A lot of people don't know that we're from Cincinnati, too. They're undefeated, but they've got something coming."
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Continental Indoor Football League Stories from April 20, 2010
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