Marshals at Fayetteville Guard
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We got up about 11:30 to head out to get some breakfast. We stopped at the Biscuit
Kitchen for breakfast, then returned to the hotel for some rest before we had to eat the
pre-game meal at Fazoli's, so far so good.
We get to the arena and it is a very nice venue for indoor football. However, our
equipment is not there yet. So we wait and wait and wait. About 30 minutes before we
have to take the field for warm-ups our equipment gets there. It's not new equipment
but somewhat old equipment. The shoulder pads were decent but the helmets weren't
very good. The pants were new and the pants were purple. Yes purple and our helmets
were purple too (about the color of this background). The jerseys weren't new was well
they were white and had the words "Ruff Riders" across the chest. Are you kidding me?
Hahaha. So for one night we were the Cincinnati Ruff Riders.
Nobody's equipment fits real well. Some of the smaller guys are wearing pants 2 sizes too
big. Needless to say we had to take the field. We were not quite sure how much Owner
Steve was going to interact with us during the game as he took over the head coach
duties. He let Carpenter coach the defense and the special teams and he was out on field
with the offense.
It was kind of weird offensively because Steve would interact sometimes and other times
let me call the plays. There was never any real flow. That was a little expected anyway.
It is also hard that all this is happening as we are right in the middle of the playoff race,
but the show must go on.
Things weren't good from the very start and we kicked off and Fayetteville took the
opening kickoff back for a TD. However, our offense responded marching right down the
field and I hooked up with Tobias Deans for a TD.
They came back and scored two more consecutive Touchdowns. On our next drive we
were faced with a 4th and 4 on their 15-yard line, Steve elected to go for it instead of
letting Obert kick the FG. Askew was tackled just short of the first down. On our next
drive we managed to knock it in for a score. Our next drive was after a turnover on
downs by our defense. On the next play I hit Askew on the right side but he got hit at
the same time and the defender managed to wrestle it away from Askew. That was the
kind of night and week it was for us: stuff just not going our way at all. Halftime score
they were up 28-14.
The second half we were able to maintain but not pull any closer as we matched their
scoring in the second half. It was just a blah game for us, but I liked the fact that we
came down despite all the adversity and equipment problems and not getting much sleep
at all the night before the game. To only lose by 2 TDs was pretty good. Our team wasn't
down; instead, we stayed positive after the game.
Needless to say the dramatics weren't over yet. Askew was driving our fan back, Megan
in the Freestar, and someone else was driving the 15-passenger van. We all got
directions from one of the security guys at Fayetteville's arena. Turn right at the stop
sign and left and the next stop sign and that will take you to route 87. So Askew did that
but no one was behind us so we called back and they said they had to get gas and we were
going the wrong way anyhow. So we got gas and were on our way for about 40 minutes.
All of a sudden 3 lanes go down to one in a hurry. It is a military stop or something like
that because they had to check our I.D.s because they were looking for a criminal.
While talking to the guard, we said that we were on our way back to Cincinnati and we
were getting to route 87. The guard paused and said route 87 is the other way.
So as it turns out Askew and our van were going the right way before Megan's van told
us we were going the wrong way. So we turned around. Then I got to thinking about how
they messed up the directions. They counted a stop sign that was in the Arena parking
lot. Duh. You know how sometimes there are stop signs in parking lots like grocery
stores to slow cars down. Well they counted that stop sign as one the security guy was
talking about. Our van was smart enough to know that he was talking about stop signs
outside the Arena parking lot!
Now we started going back the right way and passed the Arena about an hour and a half
after we left it the first time.
We'd be a reality T.V. show hit, I'm telling you.