Kings record first franchise victory in high-scoring match against the Sabres
The Kraft Family IFL 2008/09 preseason certainly came to a close with a resounding bang on Wednesday night as the expansion-Blue Sun Music Jerusalem Kings and Mike’s Place Tel Aviv Sabres decided they were in the mood to score…and score…and then score some more.
By the time the slugfest was over and all the damage assessed, the IFL record-book took the biggest hit of the evening, with numerous league scoring and offensive marks being toppled in the Kings’ first ever win as a franchise. When it was all said and done, the final score at Kraft Stadium in Jerusalem was...and yes, you are reading correctly…52-40 for the hosts in a contest that illustrated just how many ways there are to put points on the board in a football game.
There were myriad story lines in this encounter, enough for three or four typical games at least. From heroic performances on both sides, to a team gaining over 420 net yards…in a losing cause, to a pair of 100-yard rushers…on the same team, to an onside kick returned for a touchdown, to a kicker racking up over 400 yards on kickoffs, to a total of 14 TD’s scored…this one had it all. Unfortunately, the game was marred slightly by inexperienced officiating and some blown calls on crucial plays, but what can you do…refs at any level are always blind!
The Sabres got the scoring smorgasbord started on the first possession of the game when QB Roi Yair lofted a beautiful 14-yard TD pass to rookie-receiver Tamir Elterman for a very-short-lived 6-0 lead.
Elterman put on a Herculean effort all night long, packing a full season of stats into a single game en route to setting a number of IFL offensive records. To run through the mind-boggling numbers, Elterman caught two first-half touchdowns for 42 yards, but he was just getting started.
After taking over for Yair at quarterback in the second half, the wiry youngster ran 10 times for 107 yards and three more scores plus throwing for another 18 yards for a grand total of five touchdowns and 167 total yards. He also recovered a surprise third-quarter Tel Aviv onside kick to keep his team in the game when the Kings were still within reach. All-around, it would be hard to imagine anyone in the IFL having a more complete game all season – that is, if it didn’t happen in the same game by a player in the opposing jersey.
Kings’ quarterback Joseph Marticius had a game for the ages in leading his Jerusalem squad to its first win, throwing the team on his back and leading by example drive after drive. The Kings came into the contest after a crushing 20-0 loss just two days earlier to the Big Blue Jerusalem Lions and in need of an inspiring performance to lift the spirits of all the players. After a bruising training camp and preseason, the Kings were in need of some sort of reward for all their hard work and Marticius made sure that redemption would come in the shape of a preseason victory.
His numbers, while unbelievable, just don’t do this performance justice. The fiery quarterback was 4-10 passing for 84 yards and three TD strikes, while also running ten times for 136 yards, most ever by an IFL QB, and three more touchdowns. His six TDs combined were also an IFL record, eclipsing Elterman by one, who would have also broken the previous mark with his five. More than the stats, however, was Marticius’ unwillingness to lose this game or allow his Kings teammates to lose focus or become discouraged or tired, despite the many opportunities when they could have folded.
A 28-yard touch pass for a score by Marticius knotted the game at six before a 37-yard interception return for a TD by the Kings’ Chaim Gross and a pair of over-30-yard six-point runs by the red-headed play-caller gave Jerusalem a 26-6 lead before Tel Aviv could even catch its collective breath. Things did not settle down there, however, and each team kept on throwing, and landing, scoring haymakers, seemingly at will. Four touchdowns were scored in the final four minutes of the first half – two by each side – to see the Kings up 38-20 going into the interval.
The third quarter witnessed just one score, a seven-yard dart into the end zone by Elterman, and another TD by the athletic Tel Aviv wunderkind brought the Sabres to within just four points at 38-34. Marticius responded to his foe with a 26-yard pass to the back of the endzone that Gross somehow hauled in for his second touchdown of the day, but Elterman, in a display that brought to mind furious video-game football comebacks, quickly marched his team down the field on a drive that culminated in a three-yard TD plunge that made it a one possession game with 1:25 remaining.
It proved to be enough drama for one evening, though, as the Sabres’ onside kick went right into the hands of the King’s Max Rivkin, who also had nine kickoffs for 405 yards on the day – almost half a kilometer in kick. Rivkin danced into the endzone on a 18-yard return to ice the game and allow the Kings to finally ice their bone-tired, but equally satisfied, bodies, after a doozy of a 52-40 game that will go down in the IFL annals as the day that two teams combined for almost 700 yards and 92 points.
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