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Twisters Game Notes

July 26, 2007 - arenafootball2 (af2)
Arkansas Diamonds News Release


ARKANSAS TWISTERS NEWS & NOTES

Amarillo Dusters (3-12) vs. Arkansas Twisters (11-4)

Week 18 - Saturday, July 28, 7:05pm

Alltel Arena (6,820)

QUICK FACTS:

Amarillo Dusters (3-12) Vs. Arkansas Twisters (114)

Date: Saturday, July 28

Kickoff: 7:05pm Central Time

Site: Alltel Arena

Radio: KABZ 103.7 The BUZZ

Pre-Game show starts @ 6:45pm

(Jake Hatley, Dick "Mackie" McDonald)

Internet: www.1037thebuzz.com

Ticket Prices: $38, $23, $21, $17, $12, $10

Playoffs: The Twisters have earned a spot in the 2007 ArenaCup Playoffs. It's the fourth time in the last six years the Twisters will be playing in the postseason. Arknasas will earn home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs with a win over Amarillo.

Series Record: AR leads 3-1

Last Meeting: 4-20-07 - AR Won 63-55

(Amarillo, TX) - When Arkansas looked at the schedule during the off-season, many had their doubts whether the team could win one or even both games on the road in Texas. The Twisters proved all doubters wrong and finished their two game road trip by beating Amarillo 63-55 in Amarillo, TX. The Twisters started the week by beating Lubbock 51-48 just six days ago. The team traveled to Amarillo on Monday and practiced in the Dusters' Arena for the remainder of the week. Brian Villanueva led the Twisters by completing 20 of 29 passes for 254 yards, six touchdowns and two interceptions. Kevin Williams scored three times, while Jon Schoonover led all players with nine catches for 137 yards. Defensively, Arkansas was led by Pierre Thomas with seven tackles, while Williams intercepted a pass. Streaks: Arkansas has won two straight and could clinch home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs with a win over Amarillo. Amarillo has lost three straight games.

Coaches:

Twisters - John Gregory: 11-4 (26-17, 3rd Year)

CONTACTS:

Twisters: Jake Hatley

Office: 501-907-2330 Cell: 501-247-8524

Fax: 501-907-2327 Email: jhatley@arkansastwisters.com

Dusters: Warren McCarty

Cell: 806-584-5674 Office: 806-322-7277

Fax: 806-322-5425 Email: warren@dustersfootball.com

PRACTICE, INTERVIEW & TRAVEL SCHEDULE:

PRACTICE: Tuesday - Thursday; 8am-10am Alltel Arena

THE STAKES: HOME FIELD ADVANTAGE - The Twisters can clinch home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs with a win over Amarillo.

THE IFs:

If Arkansas defeats Amarillo, it would...

- clinch home field advantage in the first round of the playoffs.

- give Coach Gregory his 27th win as Twisters coach

- be the 12th win of the season, the most wins in franchise history.

TWISTERS HEAD COACH: John Gregory has seen just about everything a coach can see in one sport. His first job in football was back when Lyndon B. Johnson was President of the United States. Since then he has consistently taken over football programs that have struggled before his arrival and led them to success.

The former 2-time AFL Coach of the Year built the Twisters into a playoff contender in 2006. Gregory led Arkansas to its best start ever by winning his first three games. The Twisters won 10 regular season games for just the second time in franchise history and advanced to the National Conference Championship game. He coached the team to its first victories over Oklahoma City and Macon while beating rival Tulsa three times, the final time coming in the playoffs. The team set a franchise record for most total wins in a season with 12 and the 10 regular wins was the second most in franchise history.

The '06 Twisters also featured one of the best defenses in af2, tying a league record for sacks in a season with two Twisters players being named to the All-af2 first team for the first time ever.

Gregory started his coaching career as an assistant head coach and athletic director at Iowa Central Community College where he was charged with building a football program from the ground up. In just three years, the program had a 24-3-1 record and won the Wool Bowl in '69. Gregory's success at Iowa Central CC went on after he left. John Matusak was a Gregory recruit, and he went on to become the number one pick in the 1974 NFL Draft.

Gregory got his first college head coaching job at South Dakota State in 1971 and stayed for 10 years. To this day, Gregory is still second in school history in coaching victories and he led the team to a single season best of 9-2 in '79. SDSU didn't have a winning record the previous 11 seasons before Gregory's arrival.

After a one year stop as offensive coordinator at his alma mater of Northern Iowa, Gregory went further north to Canada and the Canadian Football League.

While in the CFL, Gregory won a CFL championship in ‘84 as the offensive line coach for Winnipeg. Gregory's offensive line helped the team set a CFL rushing record in ‘84 and Gregory was named CFL Outstanding Offensive Line Coach.

Saskatchewan noticed what Winnipeg had, and gave Gregory his first professional head coaching job and he didn't disappoint. Saskatchewan didn't have a winning season in the 11 years prior to Gregory's arrival, and they didn't win a Grey Cup (CFL Title) in 22 years. In 1989, Gregory led a Saskatchewan team that no one gave much of a chance of winning, and won the Grey Cup championship. In the process, Gregory was named CFL Coach of the Year, and he was elected to the Saskatchewan Hall of Fame in 1996. Gregory went on to coach for Hamilton of the CFL in '91, making the postseason four of the five years he was with the team before the founder of a new football league came calling.

Jim Foster invented Arena Football and needed a coach for a team he was starting in Des Moines, IA. Foster interviewed and hired Gregory to build the Iowa team from scratch. Gregory looked high and low for players; even recruiting a little known quarterback he heard was working at a local grocery store. Gregory gave Kurt Warner a tryout, and the rest is, as they say, history. Gregory coached the Barnstormers to five division titles in six years, led the team to two Arena Bowl title games, and the offense was the one of the most innovative offenses the sport had ever seen. Warner and his processor, Aaron Garcia were recently named as two of the greatest AFL players ever. Gregory earned AFL Coach of the Year honors in '95 and '96, the only coach in AFL history to do so, and nearly made it three in a row when he finished second '97.

The Barnstormers relocated to New York in 2000 and Gregory left the team in '03. After a brief stop at Carolina, Gregory decided to call it a career in coaching. Then Gregory got another call from Jim Foster.

Foster told Gregory of a team that is the "Jewel of the af2" and needed his help. The team was successful early on, but had won just 4 of its last 20 games. Along with af2 President Jerry Kurz, and Jack Lankford, Gregory was convinced staying in retirement was the thing to do. Gregory took over the Arkansas Twisters four games into the 2005 season, going 5-7. The final four losses were by a combined score of 19 points, with two games being decided in the last minute of play.

WEEK 16 RE-CAP: 7-14-07

Twisters Defeat OK City; Have Chance to Earn Home Playoff Game

(Oklahoma City, OK) - The Arkansas Twisters defeated Oklahoma City 58-28 in front of 8220 fans at the Ford Center and learned after the game Arkansas can host a first round playoff game with a win in their regular season finale. Arkansas started the scoring in the first quarter with help from its defense. The Twisters stopped Oklahoma City on fourth down, and the offense turned it into points when Jon Schoonover caught an eight yard pass from Brian Villanueva to give the Twisters the early lead.

The Twisters stopped the Yard Dawgz again on fourth down when Colby Clark sacked Oklahoma City quarterback Stan Hill. Arkansas scored on the next play when Terrance Freeney ran the ball three yards for the touchdown and the extra point put the Twisters up 14-0.

Oklahoma City answered with their first touchdown of the game when Jarrail Jackson ran the ball in from five yards out to cut the Twisters lead in half through the first quarter. Arkansas began the second quarter with a bizarre play.

Villanueva threw down field on third down from his own 17 yard line and Robert Kilow made a circus style catch in the endzone where the ball bounced off the wall, off the defender, but never appeared to touch the ground. The officials conversed about the play and awarded the Twisters the score and the extra point put Arkansas up 21-7.

Oklahoma City drove down field on the ensuing drive and had the ball first goal at the eight yard line. Hill's short pass was intercepted by Jason Simpson and returned 41 yards for the touchdown. The extra point put Arkansas up 28-7 in the second and the Twisters led 28-14 at halftime.

The Yard Dawgz closed within one score when they opened the second half with a touchdown. Allan Krutulis capped a long drive with a one yard run to pull Oklahoma City within 28-21.

Arkansas ran off four unanswered touchdowns to pull away. Villanueva finished the game by completing 12 of his 28 passes for 148 yards, four touchdowns and one interception. Robert Kilow had five catches for 58 yards and one touchdown. He eclipsed 1000 yards receiving for the season, joining Schoonover as the only set of Twisters teammates to accomplish the feat in the same season. Simpson finished the game with a game high 11.5 tackles, two interceptions, one returned for a touchdown and three pass breakups. He upped his season total to 132.0 tackles for the season to break the af2 record set by Florida's Levy Brown the week before. Pierre Thomas finished with 10.5 tackles to give him 101.0 tackles on the season to become just the second set of teammates with 100 tackles in the same season in league history.

The Twisters learned after the game that Bossier- Shreveport and South Georgia both lost their respective games. Arkansas can clinch the fourth seed in the af2 Playoffs and a first round home game if they can defeat Amarillo at Alltel Arena in the regular season finale on Saturday, July 28.

FORWARD MOTION: The Twisters play their final regular season game. Arkansas will take on Amarillo at Alltel Arena on July 28th before they embark on the road to the ArenaCup.

2007 ARKANSAS TWISTERS SCHEDULE

Date Opponent Result Score Record

3-31 @ South Georgia L 31-47 0-1

4-15 @ Lubbock W 51-48 1-1

4-20 @ Amarillo W 63-55 2-1

4-28 CORPUS CHRISTI W 93-19 3-1

5-5 @ Laredo W 55-33 4-1

5-12 BOSSIER-SHREVEPORT W 64-50 5-1

5-20 SOUTH GEORGIA L 37-40 5-2

5-26 @ Tulsa W 36-19 6-2

6-2 LUBBOCK L 49-51 6-3

6-16 OKLAHOMA CITY W 51-39 7-3

6-23 @ Everett W 64-60 8-3

6-30 TULSA W 45-39 9-3

7-7 @ Bossier-Shreveport L 29-53 9-4

7-14 LAREDO W 41-21 10-4

7-21 @ Oklahoma City W 58-28 11-4

Date Opponent Time Streak Series

7-28 AMARILLO 7:05 W 3-1

TWISTERS' INJURY REPORT:

Pos. Name Injury Status

OL/DL James Cardenas MCL IR

WR Errick McCown Turf Toe IR

IR- Injured Reserve, min 4 games missed

RECENT ROSTER MOVES:

Date Action Player

5-25 Retirement Reggie Swinton

5-25 Assigned Mike Matthes

7-6 Waiver Claim Jamie Goodwin

MILESTONES: Several Twisters players are approaching milestone numbers this season. Record Setter: DB Jason Simpson finished the game at Oklahoma City with 11.5 to become the first player in af2 history to record 130 tackles in a single season. Simpson upped his total to 132.0. Simpson has one game remaining to hold off Florida's Levy Brown for the record. Below is a look at the top single season tacklers in league history.

Record for most Tackles in af2 Season

Tackles Player Team Year

132.0 JASON SIMPSON ARKNASAS 2007

126.0 LEVY BROWN FLORIDA 2007

121.5 Willaim Haith Manchester 2005

121.0 Rico Curtis San Diego 2002

Two to 100: DB Pierre Thomas eclipsed 100 tackles on the season in the win over Oklahoma City. He finished the game with 10.5 tackles to up his total to 101.0 to give Arkansas just the second set of teammates in league history with 100 tackles each in the same season. Florida DB's Quincy Sorrell and Cory Bailey finished with 102.5 and 117.5 respectively in 2006. Below is a look at the top tacklers in the league this season.

2007 af2 Tackle Leaders

Tackles Player Team

132.0 JASON SIMPSON Arkansas

126.0 Levy Brown Florida

111.5 Chris Royal WB-Scranton

106.5 Steven Cason Green Bay

101.0 PIERRE THOMAS Arkansas

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