Soul travel West again to take on SaberCats

          

        The Philadelphia Soul will head to the west coast for the second straight week, this time to take on the SaberCats in San Jose on Sunday night. 

           

     The SaberCats opened their season last week playing spoiler in Portland, blowing out the Thunder in the franchises inaugural game by a score of 64-34 at the Moda Center in Portland, Or.

Against Portland, SaberCats quarterback Russ Michna was 12/16 in the game, throwing for 166 yards and five touchdowns. After the SaberCats had a comfortable lead, quarterback Nathan Stanley took Michna’s role behind center, where he was 8 for 14, throwing for 89 yards and three touchdowns.

Wide receiver Rod Harper came up with 105 receiving yards on six receptions, bringing in two touchdowns in the win. Wide receiver Reggie Gray caught four touchdowns in the game, gaining 102 yards on six receptions. Receiver Jason Willis also scored two touchdowns against Portland.

Defensive lineman Jason Stewart had one sack on Thunder quarterback Darron Thomas for eight yards. Defensive back David Hyland intercepted Thomas in the third quarter.

             

   San Jose is coming off a shorter week than the Soul, as the SaberCats played the Thunder on Monday, while Philadelphia battled the Rattlers Saturday night. This gives San Jose two extra days to look over game film of Philadelphia, who battled the Rattlers strong before losing in overtime on an interception from quarterback Dan Raudabaugh.

  

              Raudabaugh and his teammates have had success against the San Jose Sabercats since this team core was assembled two years ago, as the team has grabbed a win against San Jose in each of the last two seasons. The Soul defeated the SaberCats 61-55 on April 15, 2012 at the Wells Fargo Center, when a Soul challenge ruled that Philadelphia recovered a fumble from quarterback Mark Grieb in the final moments of the game to seal the win.

Last season, Philadelphia slammed the door on San Jose, earning a 65-43 win over the favored ’Cats on July 20. Philadelphia jumped out to a 27-0 lead in the game, forcing four turnovers on downs on defense, and never looked back in the contest. Raudabaugh connected on 20 of his 33 pass attempts, putting up 181 yards and five touchdowns with no interceptions. Tiger Jones put up three touchdowns in the game.

Michna led San Jose in the defeat going 15 of 37 on attempts with 206 yards, five touchdowns and one interception.

San Jose has since upgraded their roster roster this past season with the acquistions of Reggie Gray, who spent his last three seasons as a receiver for the now folded Chicago Rush. Gray will look to provide the Saber Cats with the spark the team was missing last season, as Gray is coming off a 1,978 yard season, catching 46 touchdowns on 140 receptions. Gray averages 14.1 yards a reception.

Defensive back Clevan Thomas resigned with the SaberCats this past offseason, looking to defend his ‘Defensive back of the year’ award. Last season, Thomas brought in 15 intereceptions and 334 yards.

         Darren Arbert returns to SaberCats as the team's head coach once again, the position he has held since 1999. Arbert was the coach of the SaberCats when Philadelphia defeated San Jose in Arena Bowl XXII in 2008, where Arbert is remembered for his chosen words for the officiating crew late in the fourth quarter of the game.    

       The key for Philadelphia to get a win in San Jose is to get to Michna and limit his availability down field. Rayshaun Kizer did a good job keeping up with the Rattlers receivers for most of last week, but if he gets matched up with Reggie Gray, it could be a very similar matchup to the one Kizer had with Poots last Saturday. Kizer was burned in the end, as Poots brought in a number of touchdowns in the game and turned out being the best player on offense for the Rattlers in their win.

The SaberCats showed the league they are serious contenders on Monday night with their blowout over Portland, but this will be a much tougher task for the San Jose defense going up against Raudabaugh, who will be looking for Jones and Ryan McDaniel all night, all of which have a history of lighting up the San Jose defense. Derrick Ross should be seeing more carries this week than he did in the loss to Arizona, where he only saw 12 touches in the game. Ross can find openings up the middle of the San Jose defense, or spread the field to the outside corners and gape his way away from the SaberCat defenders to march down the field.

If Raudabaugh can keep from turning the ball over, which he did last week until the final play of the game, the Soul will be in great position to win this game. The defense may not face as many opportunities to turn the ball over on downs as they did last year against this team, but the chances should certainly rise throughout the game. It will certainly be a tough task for the Soul to travel to the West coast for the second time in a week and take on one of the top teams in the league, but if the Soul can find a way to leave this weekend with a win, the team can head into the bye week with a load of confience and prepare for another roadtrip to Tampa Bay in two weeks.

Kickoff for the Soul against the Rattlers is scheduled for 8 p.m. on Sunday, March 23 and can be seen on ESPN 3.