The Pittsburgh Power fell to the Orlando Predators mostly because of three special teams breakdowns. The first was a 54 yard kickoff return by Josh Bush. Pittsburgh had just taken a 14-0 lead and was looking good. Bush took it to the house to put Orlando on the board.
The later turn of events was the dagger in the hearts of the Power faithful. Orlando scored early in the second half when backup turned starter Collin Drafts found TT Toliver for a six yard touchdown pass to make it 40-34 Orlando. On the ensuing kickoff the bounce took a nice deflection off the rebound nets and Pittsburgh could not recover the ball in time as it fell into the waiting arms of Chris Duvalt for a stunning Orlando touchdown. If this wasn't bad enough, the next play saw the same thing happen. Another ridiculous bounce, another Duvalt touchdown.
Pittsburgh had now seen four unanswered Orlando touchdowns in the span of about seven minutes of game time. Needless to say it would have been easy to fold under that kind of pressure, but give the Power some credit, as they battled all the way to the end.
Bernard Morris returned from two weeks off and showed why he is the right choice to lead the Power on offense. He finished the day 18 for 31, for 237 yards, 7 TD's and one interception. He also added 59 yards rushing to his totals. The one interception was a killer though as he forced the ball on the potential game-tying drive into double coverage where it was intercepted by Orlando's Travis Coleman.
Orlando's Collin Drafts, filling in for Nick Hill, finished the day 23 for 34, with 264 yards, 5 passing touchdowns, one interception, and his mobility on the ground netted 26 more yards and a score.
I'll admit this matchup didn't look very good for Pittsburgh but the defense did a great job containing the trio of 1000 yard receivers for the Predators. Josh Lay had an interception for the second week in a row, and Lonnell DeWalt continued his strong Ironman football, forcing and recovering a football, and adding two touchdowns on offense.
Kudos to DJ Hall for having a strong game in his return to the lineup. He ended up leading Pittsburgh with eight catches for 81 yards and three touchdowns.
Pittsburgh also had some success avoiding the interception with Orlando having three of the top ten pass thieves in the league. Unfortunately the Orlando secondary struck in the final seconds of the game.
This loss is a big blow to the Power's playoff chances as Cleveland beat Milwaukee with three seconds to go to take sole possession of first place.
Pittsburgh has also now lost to the two potential wild card teams out of the Southern Division, so winning the division is now of paramount importance to the Power if they expect to make the American Conference playoffs.
Pittsburgh returns home this week to take on the Arizona Rattlers, who are tied for the best record in the AFL. Power faithful, we need you to show up to the Consol Energy Center to support the team because this is a MUST WIN GAME!
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