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+---- Thread: *Austin Copperheads Weekly Gameball Report (/showthread.php?tid=31297)
*Austin Copperheads Weekly Gameball Report - RDBSouthPaw - 04-05-2021
Week 1 Gameball Awards The first game of the season has finally come and with it we have our first 2 game ball awards of the season. The Copperheads started this season on the road against the very young Baltimore Hawks. Both teams came into this one with a lot to prove as last season did not go as expected for either one of these organizations. With a new crop of young talent the Hawks looked to put up a fight in the opening game of this season. However, the Copperheads looked ready to correct the mistakes of last year. The game was an absolute shootout as both teams took advantage of spotty defensive plays. Moving into halftime the Copperheads held onto a slim 21-16 lead. That lead was quickly erased though as rookies Luke Quick and Preston Parker added scores for the Hawks and they took 31-21 lead. The Copperheads stayed resilient though and managed to grab the lead back. With under 2 minutes to play the Hawks grabbed another touchdown and took the lead for what seemed to be the last time in the game. However, Leo Bloomfield @BloomeyGB and the Copperheads offense had other plans as they managed to march right down the field and tie the game up with only 21 seconds left to go! Leo Bloomfield again played the hero as he knocked in another kick from 36 yards away in Overtime to give the Copperheads a 41-38 victory. It was more difficult of a win than the Copperheads had anticipated but, it was a win nonetheless.
Offensive Breakdown
Coming off a strong rookie campaign, the second year man Jackie Daytona @Mooty99 looked to continue the success he found last season where he threw for 4683 yards and 19 TDs. The young QB looked comfortable behind an offensive line that gave him plenty of time to throw the ball. Conner Quigley @WhatAmUs managed an impressive 10 pancakes on the day and was a huge reason why Daytona was able to throw for 382 yards and 3 TDs in the game. Although Daytona had some mistakes in this one, including turning the ball over twice deep in our own territory; he looked comfortable and we are expecting big things from him this season. Another key performer on the night was running back Zoe Watts @Kyamprac. Watts was coming off a disappointing season last year and was looking to make big improvements this season. With that in mind she managed to carry the ball for 135 yards on 30 attempts and score 2 TDs in what was a definite MVP caliber performance from the former award winner! Another player that showed he was ready to make an impact this year was TE Friedrich Vequain @Sutj . Vequain managed to grab 7 receptions on the night for 64 yards and a TD, showing that he is a serious threat on the offensive side of the ball this year. However, the big performance of the night came from Veteran WR Videl-San @ValorX77 who managed 4 receptions and 156 yards and 2 TDs. Videl-San was crucial to the success tonight as both TDs came in critical moments to give the Austin Offense the boost they needed. The biggest catch of the night came late in 3rd as Videl-San took the pass from Daytona for 84 yards to cut into the Hawks lead. Great job from all of our key offensive performers and congrats Videl-San on the first game ball of the season!
Defensive Breakdown
While the offensive seemed to be firing on all cylinders, the defense seemed to struggle at times. Forced to play with their backs near the goal line due to a couple of blocked punts and turnovers. The team found themselves giving up more points than they probably expected in this one. Newly acquired Hamish MacAndrew @IthicaHawk started his Copperhead career off right by adding 6 tackles and 1 PD on the night. Another bright spot on the night was newly formed LB trio of Thomaslacher, Montain, and Kennedy @Amidships @RDBSouthPaw @Dagumpa combining for a total of 15 tackles in a game that required them to play more of a coverage role than what they might have expected. Slinky Claxton @Shiznit19 also managed to add the first sack for the Copperhead Defense. The top performance on the night came from Maverick Bowie @Tonzy though. Opposing QB Luke Skywalker dropped back 45 times on this one and only managed to complete 25 of those 45 throws. Bowie as a big reason for this as he allowed only 5 catched on the 12 balls that were thrown in his direction. He also managed 4 tackles and 2 PDs on the night. Although it was not the performance we were all expecting from this Copperhead Defense, they got the job done and that is all that matters! Congrats to Maverick Bowie!
Week 2 Gameball Awards Another week of games played, and another insane nail-biter all the way until the end! After a tough road win last week, we were once again faced with another tough road challenge, heading into Arizona to face the Outlaws! They were seeking their first win of the season, and we were seeking to continue showing how the new and improved Copperheads roll. The game started pretty favorable for both teams without too much explosive flair, but Arizona started to pull away pretty convincingly thanks to their insane run game and defense. Things were looking scary, as Nakamura had put up two TDs on us, and their defense by the third quarter had caused our man Daytona to fumble TWICE when being sacked. At that point, we were down 7-23, but let it never be said that the Copperheads aren't resilient and filled with determination. In just a few minutes, we managed to score off a 32-yard rush by Zoe Watts and then shortly after kick a field goal. Now we head into the fourth, and the situation is crazy. After another Arizona score, we're down 16-30 with seemingly no clear path to victory. Until we scored, and then score again in no less than 2 seconds. And with one last victory punch, the Copperheads escape the vicious snake trap of defeat with their MASSIVE JAWS OF VICTORY! Despite an insane performance by Arizona RB Nakamura and their equally scary defense, nothing could stop the Copperheads from continuing their romp of victory upon the season.
Offensive Breakdown
As we look to dissect the play of the offense, one must once again give high praises to our stand-out passer, Jackie Daytona @Mooty99! We relied on him heavily this game to move the ball, and move the ball he did with 286 passing yards off of a whopping 30 completions. He also scored himself a touchdown through the air! And while one can say he might have looked like one of my Madden QBs fumbling twice, his ball security through the air was perfect despite the 45 different passing attempts he had, which is definitely not easy to do. We then turn to his fantastic supporting cast of catchers, with our standouts being WR Videl-San @ValorX77 and TE Friedrich Vequain @Sutj ! Videl-San was our work horse once again, catching 8 of 13 targets for a whole 105 yards, making up almost half of Daytona's passing yardage. And as for Vequain, they only gained about 13 yards, but it was off of 5 different catches, one of which was the lone passing TD of the day! I'd also like to mention our offensive linemen, Slurms McKenzie @SlurmsMckenzie, who put up a whole 7 pancakes! But all in all, our big offensive MVP is none other than the league's leading rusher, Zoe Watts @Kyamprac! First and foremost, WHAT A GAME. It's safe to say she forged to the path to victory for us, as not only did she score a 39 yard TD, but she also scored a 32 yard TD as well. And that's not even including her 2 yard TD she made during our comeback in the fourth. Rushing for a whole 117 yards off of 19 attempts, Watts would just not be denied by the defense! Leading all rushers in yards and TDs, you better believe we expect her to continue playing like an absolute MVP and crushing any team who thinks that they can stop her!
Defensive Breakdown
Hamish MacAndrew @IthicaHawk. A name that inspires fear in the hearts of his enemies, and spirit in the hearts of his fans and teammates. On paper, he is a free safety; but in reality, he is a one-man defensive powerhouse. In week two of the ISFL regular season, Hamish MacAndrew took the field against the Arizona Outlaws with his sights set on completely demoralizing them. As he navigated the backward trenches of the secondary in his usual fashion, three quarters passed and hope for the Copperheads was dwindling to the tune of 23 to 16. But, do you know who didn’t give up? That’s right, Hamish MacAndrew didn’t give up. He said, “Hell No!”, and kicked his gears into overdrive. As the Copperheads mounted a 21 point comeback in the fourth quarter, Hamish saw his golden opportunity. As Cortez wound up his arm to throw a deep bomb down the field, McAndrew’s eyes narrowed to focus on the opposing quarterback. Cortez fired his cannon, and Hamish locked in on his small, leathery target. He read the pass perfectly, and jumped the route to make a play on the errant ball. As he sniped the pigskin out of the sky like a seasoned hunter, he immediately turned his sights downfield and saw The Light. The Yellow Brick Road. The open lane to the endzone. MacAndrew cradled the ball with haste, and took off in a cloud of smoke like a drag racer.
Twenty-one yards. It’s a Pick Six. The Austin fans in the crowd go wild, as the breath is knocked out of the Outlaws. This feat of athletic prowess and raw football IQ ties the ball game. Hearts and Minds people, Hearts and Minds. All it takes is a last minute TD, and the incredibly tight and well-fought game is won for the Copperheads. Off the back of an amazing game-tying play by Hamish MacAndrew.
And he’s just getting started.
Week 3 Gameball Awards Nola rolled into Austin with big expectations as they are led by quarterback Ben Slothlisberger who has been known to consistently give us a hard time and things looked great for NOLA right out of the gate due to an early mistake by Jackie Daytona that resulted in a pick within Austin territory. NOLA quickly capitalized on this mistake and put 7 points on the board early thanks to a 41-yard pass from Slothlisberger that set up a Mike Rotchburns 3-yd TD. Our offense struggled to get going after that as we were forced to punt on our next two possessions to close out the first quarter down 7-0. The second quarter looked eerily similar to the first quarter for us as we once again struggled to get anything going on offense. Thankfully, we finally broke through with about four minutes left to go when Bloomfield put a nice 35 yarder through the uprights to give us our first points of the game. Despite our offensive struggles, our defense was holding strong and keeping us in the game by only surrendering 6 points on two field goals which meant that we were only trailing 13-3 at half-time.
After half-time is when we finally woke up and began playing Copperhead football. Our defense managed a quick stop on NOLA’s first possession and Daytona responded by leading us down the field and completing an 8-yard TD pass to Howlett. Our defense once again forced a 3-and-out on NOLA and we were able to grab another 3 points thanks to a 67-yard bomb to Videl-San to set up another Bloomfield FG. The game was all tied up at this point and we weren’t looking back. Our defense continued to shut down the NOLA offense and our offense put up two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter thanks to a nice TD grab by Vequain from 12 yards out and a nice little 12 yard scamper from Watts. The final score ended up being 27-13 in favor of us. Our strong second-half showing coupled with our stout defensive work means that we are now 3-0 on the season!
Offensive Breakdown
This game started in the worst possible way for our offense, with an interception by the opposition on the second play of the whole game, but while this led to Austin starting seven points down, this seemed to be just the thing to kick start our offense needed to play the rest of the game with a fire lit under them. Now there were many impressive performances across our offense but the place I would like to start would be with our RB2 Jim the Vampire @Kyle. Jim normally plays as the backup but today he really stepped up his carries to truly split the load with Zoe Watts @Kyamprac and together they put together an impressive 5.4 yards per rush. Next was again a combined performance from our offensive targets, Videl-San @ValorX77 was a work horse with another hundred plus yard performance while both Doug Howlett @Rufio_NZ and Friedrich Vequain @Sutj enjoyed a touchdown each with Doug getting it along with 88 yards and Friedrich with 43 yards. Despite the early interception quarterback Jackie Daytona certainly picked up his game after that eventually ending with some genuinely nice figures of 295 yards, 76% passes complete and of course the 2 TDs. Even the offensive line got in on the excellent team display, with Connor Quigley @WhatAmUs picking up a very tasty 9 pancakes and Felix Archstone @GlimsTC 6 pancakes.
However, this game’s game ball goes to no other than our man with the magic leg Leo Bloomfield @BloomeyGB While it really took the offense a little while to get going Leo was perfect throughout the game, with 2 field goals and 3 extra points to continue his perfect run so far this season. Importantly he also registered 3 punts inside the 20 and an average punt of 55.7 yards meaning that he made the game a damn sight harder for the NOLA offense to get back into the game. Congratulations Leo!
Defensive Breakdown
When our defense performs the way that it did against NOLA, there is obviously going to be a massive amount of contribution from all over the team. Our defense managed to rack up 5 sacks on the night against a solid NOLA Offensive Line and all together held the opposing offense to 339 yards total on the night, with only 49 of those being on the ground. Guys like Thomaslacher@RDBSouthPaw and Crooks @The_Kidd were seemingly everywhere on the field at once making tackle after tackle and others like Yeboa @frazzle14 , McGullager @Philliesphan96 , Claxton @Shiznit19 , and Fitinyomouf @TheRealMazatt made their presence felt by each getting their own sack against Slothlisberger. The most impressive performance though comes from the man wearing the radio on the defense, Dex Kennedy @Dagumpa. Kennedy had a monster night by grabbing pretty much every stat imaginable for a LB. His 6 tackles were third highest on the team and he backed those up with a TFL and a beautiful strip sack that set up our final touchdown of the game. Not only did Kennedy crash the line and make plays though, but he also led the tam in PDs with 3 on the night showing why he is the best coverage LB in the league. A performance like this makes it easy to see why this man is the shot-caller for this Austin defense. He was the leader on the field against NOLA and was one of the driving forces behind our defense finally showing what they were capable of this season. I can only imagine this is just a taste of what we will see from Kennedy going forward this year.
Week 4 Gameball Awards Game four of the ISFL season saw us making a trip out to Orange County for another rivalry game against the Otters. Things got out to the perfect start for us as we went up 7-0 early on thanks to a nice long drive put together by our offense in which Jim The Vampire punched it into the endzone from 8 yards out. Our defense got off to a strong start too holding OCO to a punt on their first dive of the game. Unfortunately, the Otter’s special teams made a nice play and pinned us back on our own 10-yard line for our next possession. This awful field position led to our first miscue of the game when Dayton fumbled the snap on second-down allowing the OCO defense to pounce for a Safety. Despite the misstep our defense held strong and once again kept OCO out of the endzone on their next drive only allowing a field goal. Our offense struggled for the rest of the half though and a combination of penalties and sacks kept us from getting any sort of momentum going, meanwhile OCO was finally able to break across the goal-line meaning the score was 12-7 going into half time. We have been in situations like this before this season and we bounced back in the second half outscoring the Otters 6-3 thanks to an 88-yard TD from our big-time playmaker Videl-San. Unfortunately, we failed on the two-point conversion which made it 15-13 going into the final quarter. We scrapped as much as we could on the defensive side of the ball but OCO was able to expand their lead to 22-13 on their first dive of the quarter and our offense immediately went 3-and-out. But just when things looked the bleakest, our very own Dex Kennedy snapped up an interception and took it to the house bringing us back within striking distance 22-20. Our defense continued to hold but sadly the OCO defense proved to be too much for us, and we never got the chance to pull ahead, ultimately losing a heart-breaker in Orange County 22-20.
Offensive Breakdown
Despite the loss in Week 4, our offense still played some pretty good mistake free Football! Taking a look at our star behind center, Jackie Daytona @Mooty99 had a relatively nice time against OCO, completing 12 of 18 passing for 201 yards and a touchdown! Week in and week out, Daytona continues to provide this team with consistent movement up and down the field. We also saw continued efficiency from our run game in the form of a Jim The Vampire @Kyle who delivered the first touchdown of the game! We also saw another great performance from the O-Line, with Connor Quigley @WhatAmUs and Slurms McKenzie @SlurmsMckenzie both putting up 6 pancakes! But, as anyone who's looking at the stats knows, our offense this week ran through one player more than anyone, and it's safe to say this player had the biggest impact on the game out of anyone on both teams. That's right, I'm referring to our trusty WR - Videl-San @ValorX77 ! With just 6 catches, Videl-San put up a whopping 146 yards with one of those catches going for a full 88! Videl-San also averaged 24.3 yards a catch, and delivered a touchdown! There was not a single stat in the books that Videl-San didn't excel at. They were an all-around star that delivered their best in a game that pitted us against a pretty tough defensive unit. This game also propelled them to #1 in receiving stats by a whole 52 yards! One can only hope we continue to see more of this from Videl-San, as combined with the rest of our offensive stars, we should be in prime form to deliver what is no doubt the best offensive unit in the league!
Defensive Breakdown
This game showed just how talented our defensive unit can be this season. Although it did not end up as a win for the Copperheads; the defensive side of the ball had nothing to be disappointed about. The team managed to force a staggering 4 fumbles on the night but, they only managed to recover one of them in the end. Players that caused a fumble included Brach Thomaslacher @RDBSouthPaw , Tyler Montain @Amidships (who each added a sack on the night), Lesean Paris Crooks @The_Kidd and the young Rookie Defensive Lineman Candice D. Fitiinyomouf @TheRealMazattt ! Issac Owen @oji3001 also got in on the stat line tonight with his first fumble recovery on the year! However, the big player on the night was once again Dex Kennedy @Dagumpa . After a very strong showing in Week 3, Kennedy continued his hot start to the season with 9 Tackles, 1 PD, 1 Interception and 1 TD. Another huge night for a player that has been crucial to the success that Austin has seen over the first 4 games this season. Although the result did not end how the team was hoping. These past 2 games has shown the talent that Kennedy has and we look forward to seeing some more big plays this season! Congratulations!
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1035 words (Week 1 Intro, Week 1 Offensive, Week 1&4 Defensive)@Tonzy
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333 words (Week 3 Offensive)RE: Austin Copperheads Weekly Gameball Report - GlimsTC - 04-05-2021
Great work to my fellow Austin gameball writers! Always one of my favorite things to see
RE: Austin Copperheads Weekly Gameball Report - Kyamprac - 04-05-2021
great job guys
