Firecats enter crucial five-game stretch
The Florida Firecats are an impressive 6-0. It’s a good thing because the road to their “every year goal” — the Arena Cup — only gets harder.
Beginning with Saturday night’s road game facing the Tennessee Valley Vipers (4-3), the Firecats begin a brutal stretch during which they play four of five games against American Conference South Division rivals.
For defensive/offensive line coach Dominic Bramante, Saturday’s meeting with the Vipers also is a homecoming.
“It’s going to be different. I coached (there) for awhile,” Bramante said of his tenure with the Vipers’ organization. “It’s only going to be a homecoming if we are still undefeated afterwards.”
Sadly, the Firecats are only through one-third of their arenafootball2 regular-season schedule and injuries are starting to take their toll.
Starting defensive back Carlos Campbell already has been sidelined for two weeks and now promising lineman Thomas Carroll is out five weeks with a fracture of his right ankle, which he sustained in last week’s 49-43 win over the Manchester Wolves.
“Carlos should be back with us in three weeks and we are only expecting Carroll to miss five (weeks),” said Bramante.
Campbell’s injury could have been costly, but it turned out to be good luck for team veteran Quincy Sorrell, who became available three weeks ago, but was only able to join the team prior to last weekend’s victory over the Wolves.
“I went back to New Orleans (after last season) and was helping my mom and other friends and family them get back situated (after Hurricane Katrina),” Sorrell said of his seven-month absence from the team and organization.
“Q,” as his friends and teammates call him, is a welcome sight for Bramante, who loves the fire he brings to the team.
“He has that fire that every great team needs,” he said.
That fire could keep this year’s version of the Firecats on its winning streak. Sorrell has been with the team since the 2002 season and has seen his share of winning, including winning the Arena Cup title in 2005.
“These guys are basically established (as a team),” Sorrell said of this year’s squad. “We have a lot of hungry guys out here; a lot of new guys that aren’t familiar with arena football, but they are catching on well with the concept of it … They already seem to have come together as a family. Now it’s just about focusing on doing those small things that will make us a championship team.”
That road continues Saturday. The Firecats return home on May 24 to welcome the South Georgia Wildcats, their main division rival.