Thunder takes slump to Florida

Like the Thunder, the Firecats also started the year with three straight wins.

By PETE MOLLICA

VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF

YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning Valley Thunder coach Mike Hold is trying to find a way to snap the team’s three-game losing streak.

The Thunder returns to af2 action tonight when they travel to Estero, Fla., to meet the Florida Firecats at 7:30.

Mahoning Valley began the season with three straight victories, but has since dropped the last three, including a 56-26 loss to Wilkes-Barre⁄Scranton last week at the Chevrolet Centre.

“Florida is a good football team,” said Hold. “They are a veteran team and any team in this league with a lot of veteran players is going to be a handful to take on.

“But our problem is with ourselves,” Hold said. “We’ve had opportunities to win all three of our last three games, but we just keep shooting ourselves in the foot.

“It’s been disappointing because this is a good football team,” Hold continued. “We probably blocked the best we have all season long last week up front, but we missed several open touchdown passes, dropped a couple more and you can’t do that against good teams in this league.

“I broke down last week’s film and took out eight plays which cost us the football game,” he added. “It doesn’t take much in this league, five or six key plays that fail can just turn the came completely around like it did last week.

“Wilkes-Barre⁄Scranton is a good football team, but not that much better than we are,” he said. “If we can just eliminate the mistakes we can get right back into this race.

Same start as Thunder

The Firecats are 4-3 and also started off the season 3-0, but have dropped three of their last four games.

This will be the longest trip the Thunder has made this year, but Hold said it might be the shortest.

“A three-hour plane ride is a lot easier than a 12-hour bus ride any day of the week,” Hold said. “We had an early plane ride [5 a.m.) on Friday, but we got there early so that the team could get their legs back.”

Head didn’t make any roster moves this week.

“We’ve got a few guys banged up and if they can’t go we might be in trouble, but that’s football. It happens to just about every team at some time during the season,” he said.

In order to win tonight, the Thunder is going to have to force turnovers and improve a defense that is allowing an average of 49 points and 246.8 passing yards per game. Mahoning Valley has not intercepted a pass since Week 4 vs. Cincinnati, a game in which they had three.

Florida, on the other hand has been great at forcing turnovers, coming into the game with a +10 turnover margin. The Firecats are tied for third in af2 in interceptions with 12, and quarterback Chris Wallace has only thrown six interceptions in 247 attempts. Cornerback Levy Brown leads the af2 in tackles with 58.5 and has six pick-offs in seven games.

Mahoning Valley has split its only two road games this season, while Florida is just 1-2 on its home turf.

mollica@vindy.com