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The Rock River Raptors and Randy Bell
lead the CIFL in rushing, and Mr. Touchdown has scored an amazing 36 touchdowns this CIFL season. As we reported earlier Randy had a tryout with the Buffallo Bills this week, but Coach Jones says Randy will be ready to go for the Raptors on Friday night, and we all know Randy has dominated the Slaughter both times we have seen
them this season.
The Raptors suffered a blow both on the DLine and at long snapping when Anthony Harris received an NFL contract earlier
in the season. The Raptors lineplay has been getting better as the season progresses and
Vichael Foxx, Mike Matrenga, and Shopping Cart Jones have been working over the opposing quarterbacks fairly
well of late.
Ben Sankey had no trouble beating the Chicago
Slaughter earlier in the season. We won't have all world QB Ben Sankey for this
one as he was told to stop playing indoor football by his CFL team several weeks ago.
Patrick Jackson only played 4 games for the
Raptors in 2008, but in those 4 games he came up with 5 interceptions and several
highlight film plays. Patrick has been sidelined with an injury for most of the
season and we are suspecting he may be ready to go for playoffs. This
may present a situation for the Raptors as the Raptors current secondary consisting of Domonique Dunbar, Tristan Burge, and Cordera Jackson have come up with a
ton of turnovers of late, and the Raptors actually lead the CIFL in takaways by a decent margin.
The question you have to ask yourself is how rusty will Patrick be after the long layoff even if he is ready?
Steve LaFalce will need to play his best game as
a Raptor on Friday night. He will need to bring solid leadership, make solid
decisions, and he will need to complete some medium and/or long range passes on
Chicago for the Raptors to be victorious in this CIFL tilt. Stevie is as good as
scrambler as anyone in the CIFL, but we need the threat of the deep ball as a
weapon, and Steve has not looked good going deep all season long.
Randy Bell has led the Raptors to the most first downs in the CIFL, the CIFL's
time-of-possession lead, and now the number one combined ranking after the
"suspension" of the Rochester Raiders. The CIFL's combined rank is
derived from points scored, points allowed, schedule strength, victory strength,
and point differential. To the surprise of many that don't follow Raptors
football, the Raptors have held down the number 2 power ranking spot produced by
the league for almost the entire season. This is the ranking as of today, as
presented by the league webmaster/statistician.
| 1 |
Rochester |
5 |
13 |
18 |
| 2 |
Rock River |
12 |
11 |
23 |
| 3 |
Saginaw |
6 |
22 |
28 |
| 4 |
Kalamazoo |
10 |
19 |
29 |
| 5 |
Chicago |
18 |
15 |
33 |
| 6 |
Muskegon |
27 |
7 |
34 |
| 7 |
Lehigh Valley |
22 |
15 |
37 |
| 8 |
Fort Wayne |
28 |
10 |
38 |
| 9 |
Marion |
20 |
20 |
40 |
| 10 |
New England |
16 |
27 |
43 |
| 11 |
Miami Valley |
33 |
16 |
49 |
| 12 |
Chesapeake |
38 |
15 |
53 |
| 13 |
Milwaukee |
43 |
13 |
56 |
| 13 |
Flint |
40 |
16 |
56 |
| 15 |
New Jersey |
41 |
17 |
58 |
The Rock River Raptors can not afford to be
stuffed at the goaline like it happened last time we were in Chicago. The
Raptors used to be a strong goaline team, and we need to convert every opportunity
on the Slaughter. Coach McFadden may need to be creative to punch in those tough
scores and hopefully he has had enough games under his belt to have a few tricks
in his pocket for the Slaughter defense.
JR Taylor is a short yardage force for Chicago
and the Rock River defense needs to frustrate him early. If we can shut Taylor
down again, I expect our much improved pass defense will not give up anywhere
near the 67 points they gave up last time we played in the Sears Center.
Kicker Filip Filipovic has not been setting the
indoor world on fire by any means and this season the Raptors kicking game has made 25-30 less
field goals than they did last year! Wow...that is really leaving some points on
the field!
Last year Doug Daniel converted on 31 of 52
field goals and tallied 166 points for the Raptors. This year the kicking game
has been non-existent and I can't even remember the last time we converted a
successful field goal. Doug Daniel made more field goals in one game last year than the Raptors have made this entire 2008 CIFL season!
Mike Matrenga, JoJo Moore, Brandon Tobias and
the rest of the Raptors will need to bring their A-Game to take down the
Slaughter on Friday night and play for a conference championship. The Raptors
can get it done if the defense plays like it is capable of playing, and Steve
LaFalce makes good on-field decisions. The last time we were in Chicago we made
some bad mistakes and had a couple dropped footballs and we can't afford see any of that stuff
this time if we are to continue down the CIFL championship road.
Go Raptors!!!!!
Click here
to view all of the 2008 football action photo galleries.
Click here
to view the Chicago Slaughter Girls photo gallery.
Click here
to view the Milwaukee Crush Girls cheerleader photos.
Click here
to view all of the 2008 cheerleader photo galleries.
Click here
to view the Dallas Cowboys cheerleader photo gallery.
Click here
to view the 2007 Cheerleader photo galleries.
Click here
to view all 4000 indoor football photos.
-MinoltaMan 12:02 PM 6-11-08
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