Monday, Jun. 01, 2009

Fever still in hunt for playoff spot

By Ben Reynolds, Herald staff writer

The Tri-Cities Fever lost its second game in a row by 40-plus points Saturday night, as its offense again showed why its the worst in the arenafootball2 league, failing to score a single point in the second half.

Yet, after another lackluster performance -- a 61-20 loss to top-ranked Spokane -- the Fever players remain upbeat and eager to get back to work this week.

"We just have to continue to play hard and let the chips fall where they may," said Fever linebacker/receiver Chris Hemphill.

The players believe they are going to win a few more games this season. As to how many, no one feels comfortable answering that question at this point.

The Fever sits at 1-8, planted in the bottom of the West Division standings. Yet with seven games left in the regular season, believe it or not, all is not lost for this young team.

After Saturday's loss, Tri-Cities is 11th out of 12 teams in the National Conference. But as bad as things have been -- six losses by 30 or more points -- the Fever is just two games out of the playoff picture.

And while the word "playoffs" is not a term that any Fever players or coaches have been discussing, a spot in the top eight is far from unreachable.

Stockton and Central Valley are tied for the eighth and final spot with identical 3-6 records. The Fever has two games remaining against the Lightning and one against the Coyotes.

On Saturday, the Fever plays at Stockton -- a team it beat less than a month ago. A win would give the Fever the tiebreaker over the Lightning.

The Fever also plays at Rio Grande Valley (5-3), a team Stockton pounded three weeks ago, in the second-to-last game of the season.

Sandwiched in between is two more games with Boise and one more game at Spokane.

Only four teams in af2 history have reached the postseason with a sub-.500 record.

"We're a work in progress," said Fever coach Pat O'Hara, who is 1-3 since taking over the Fever.

For "playoffs" and "Fever" to even start creeping into the same sentence, though, a fix needs to be made at quarterback.

Japan's Tomotsuna Inoue, who relieved Ryan Porter early in the second quarter Saturday night, was the Fever's fourth quarterback in nine games. As a whole, Fever quarterbacks are completing less than 50 percent of their passes on the season and have only 28 touchdown passes to go with 18 interceptions.

"That's my fault," O'Hara said. "I just need to work harder. They need more coaching."

Inoue is just the third international player in af2 history to throw a touchdown pass. He threw one against Boise two weeks ago, and then two more against the Shock on Saturday.

Emery Beckles saw his first action of the season Saturday and gave the Fever a spark on special teams, averaging more than 22 yards per return.

The 154 penality yards by the Fever was a franchise high. It broke the previous mark of 142 set last season in a 76-32 loss at Peoria.