By Dan Weber
NKyTribune sports reporter
Cedric Walker could not have been more definitive last week after his Kentucky Barrels’ so-so opening Arena Football One win.
He made two promises: That his Barrels would be much improved this week and there would be only one standard for the Barrels or any team he coaches and that would be “a championship standard,” Walker said.
And while this season is only two games old, what the Barrels did to an Oceanside Bombers team that journeyed 2,300 miles from California for this battle for a spot in first place, Walker wasn’t kidding.
The 80-42 final score represented a number of improvements for the Barrels.
“On offense,” anyway, said defensive coordinator Walker. On defense? “We got a long way to go.”
But when your offense scores 80 points, it’s the other team that has a long way to go. They may call themselves the “Bombers” but the California team had no way of matching the firepower the Barrels threw at them. Nor could they have known much of what was coming.
Like how first-ever starter Shea Spencer, out of Keiser University, a small NAIA school in West Palm Beach, Fla., would torch them. Let Walker tell you what he did: “Shea Spencer broke all of the Kentucky Barrel’s records tonight,” his coach said with a big grin for a team whose history is only two games old.
Indeed, he did. What exactly those final stats were officially is still to be determined as they weren’t available at Truist Arena nor posted on the Barrels’ or the league’s official websites. Just know this, Spencer threw for six touchdowns and added two more on quarterback sneaks.
Not a bad way to kick off your Arena Football One career. Of those two scoring runs, “You gotta’ give credit to the big guys, they do the work and I get the credit,” Spencer said, sounding like he knows how to keep the O-line guys on his side.
“He did it,” Walker said of his decision to move Spencer up to the starter’s role over Kentuckian Dalton Oliver after last week’s game. “And I did a great job not bothering him.”
On this night, there were lots of great jobs by the Barrels. One-time Philadelphia Eagle Darius Prince, a 6-foot-1, 210-pounder out of McKeesport, Pa., had a four-TD game, maybe not quite equaling his career-best six-TD night. But “overall, one of my best nights,” the Western PA. guy said after scoring from 45, 31, 15 and 10 yards out, often on diving catches into the boards.
But there was another player that Oceanside couldn’t have known the Barrels were about to hit them with. Take a bow, Barrels’ fullback Noah Buttiglierri, all 6-4 and 315 pounds of former offensive lineman lined up in the backfield with those quick feet and the ability to get to the edge way quicker than a man that big should be able to.
“Right after we walked off the field last week,” Walker said of his decision to move
Buttiglierri, out of the University of Delaware, into the backfield. “He stepped right in and he should have had a TD,” after a 10-yard sweep was called back on a penalty. But it was obvious Oceanside wasn’t ready for the big man when he got the ball.
And like always, Middletown’s Jalin Marshall, out of Ohio State and the New York Jets, was as solid as ever, scoring the final TD as two defenders bounced off him and he walked in backwards.
Then there was kicker Adam Baum, the Murray State alum, who struggled a bit early, missing two PAT’s just right of the nine-and-a-half-foot opening. He came back with his first career deuce – a kickoff that goes through the uprights and is comparable to a 70-plus yard field goal and worth two points.
“When I hit that ball, I knew I hit it good. And then I watched it and was thinking, ‘I just may have saved my job, with that one’ “Baum said. If that didn’t do it, how about his onside kick that the Barrels covered. And in this league, kicking off from your own goal line, an onside kick us as high-risk a play as a team can make. Don’t fall on the ball and your opponent has it at your 10. But as in much of what happened here, the Barrels jumped on the spinning ball as the Bombers stood and stared.
Then there was the field goal/punt block from defensive end Joe Gojden out of Oregon State that linebacker Siaosi Finau scooped up on the 15 and scampered in for a TD. The 6-4, 285-pound Golden said he didn’t exactly block it himself but picked up an O-lineman and tossed him into the kicker.
And finally, there was defensive back Joe Powell, the former New York Giant and Buffalo Bill from Portsmouth, Va., who made it clear how many ways these Barrels can beat you in the kicking game. Powell returned the opening kickoff 49 yards to the 1, setting up the Barrels’ first TD. And then he reversed field three times easily running “maybe 90 yards,” he said on a punt return TD to make it 50-22 early in the second half.
One other thing Walker wasn’t afraid to praise: “the coaching,” he said. With a full-time coach the way he is, and with the work of offensive coordinator Reggie Gray, the Barrels have an edge over “part-time staffs,” Walker said.
If there was a negative here, other than Walker’s take on his defense, it was a crowd maybe a bit more than half that of last week’s opener. And yeah, the tickets at $19.25 to $62.50 seem a bit pricey, but this team the way it’s playing deserves more than the 800 or so attendees that were here when we counted them before halftime.
SCORING SUMMARY
OCEANSIDE BOMBERS 8 14 6 13–42
KENTUCKY BARRELS 12 31 7 30–80
Barrels: Spencer 1 run (Baum PAT kick fails)
Bombers: Brooks 21 pass from Johnson (Reis PAT kick good)
Bombers: Barrels tackled in end zone on kickoff – one point awarded to Oceanside
Barrels: Flanagan 8 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick fails)
Bombers: Johnson 1 run (Reis PAT kick good)
Barrels: Prince 45 pass from Spencer (Prince run for 2)
Barrels: 2 point safety on FG blocked out of end zone)
Barrels: Spencer 1 run (Baum PAT kick good)
Barrels: Prince 10 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick good)
Barrels: Epps 30 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick good)
Barrels: Powell 35 punt return (Baum PAT kick good)
Bombers: Tucker 7 pass from Johnson (PAT kick fails, bad snap)
Bombers: Johnson 34 run (Reis PAT kick good)
Barrels: Prince 31 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick good)
Barrels: Baum two-point ‘deuce’ on kickoff through uprights
Barrels: Finau 15 blocked punt return (Baum PAT kick good)
Bombers: Tucker 3 pass from Johnson (Reis PAT kick good)
Barrels: Prince 15 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick good)
Barrels: Marshall 8 pass from Spencer (Baum PAT kick good)