WEEK ONE RECAP
PANTHERS START THE YEAR WITH A HUGE UPSET
Panthers 43, Fever 41

We can’t say we saw this one coming. Some SAC’D staffers had quietly slinked off to Vegas last week to hammer the under on the “Total Fever regular season losses” number put out at the Venetian: 1.5. Now already at 0-1, the Fever stand to lose a lot of staffers some serious coin.
“Fuck that guy,” Horace Middleton said to anyone who would listen.

Meanwhile, Coach Dorrington just has to smile. They were TWENTY point underdogs coming into this game, and many in the SACFL inner circle thought that was even a little light. That’s not to say there aren’t good expectations for the Panthers this year. It’s just that on paper their opponent looked to be an unconquerable behemoth of a mountain. So they trotted out their best lineup, crossed their fingers, and boom! They got the Fever on an off-week. The Panthers got a huge performance from QB Matt Stafford. The dust settled. And the Panthers got off to a 1-0 start for the third time in the last four years. They beat the Fever for the first time since 2011. And they upped their all-time record against them to 4-5. The only bad news of course is that FIVE Patrick Division teams won this week, putting the Cats in a five-way tie for first place at 1-0. But they’ll take it. No one had the Panthers winning this game. But they did. And now all they have to do is figure out how to eke a few more points out of this lineup on a weekly basis and they’ll be on their way. Great start for the Panthers.
For Coach Miller, this is a head-scratcher. This is like when there is a weather forecast and the whole world agrees it’s going to rain, and then at the last minute a low-pressure system suddenly just moves it out of the way. No rain. Here’s the scary part. This was an AWFUL week for the Fever in almost every single regard. And they still scored 41 points. They certainly didn’t see a loss coming here to what seemed to be an overmatched Panthers team, but like every other Norris Division team not named the Leprechauns, they’re in a five-way tie for second place. So if they’re going to lose an out-of-division game this was the time to do it. Bottom line here is we’re not worried. They had what is likely to be their worst week of the season and they lost. Okay. It happens. Now it’s time to get this juggernaut going.

So the Panthers take on the Convicts this week in an interesting affair. The Panthers are a tentative 2-point favorite in a game that obviously has huge implications. If the Panthers can win this game and get off to a 2-0 start, they put themselves in a great spot with the in-division run approaching. They can win this one. They are 10-9 all-time against the Convicts and had good success against them in the old Patrick Division. Can Coach Dorrington put the right pieces in place? For the Fever, it really wouldn’t be a real SACFL season if they didn’t take on Coach Shewmaker’s squad. Sure, now they are named the Inconvenient Truth and now they’re in a different division for the first time in SACFL history, but the story is still the same. This will be their THIRTY-FIFTH all-time game and the series is knotted up, amazingly, at 17-17. Yes, the Fever are 19-point favorites. But Coach Miller knows this game is always a challenge, and they really can’t get this year started at 0-2.