By: Matthew Hester
Southern Indoor Football League
Media Relations Director

LAKE CHARLES, LA (JULY 9, 2010) – On Saturday, the Louisiana Swashbucklers (5-6) of the Southern Indoor Football League will have to defend their title on the road beginning against the Regular Season Champion Albany Panthers (8-3).

This season has most hard to bear for Swashbucklers fans, beginning with a 50 point loss in Columbus, a fourth quarter collapse in Lafayette only to loss in overtime, coaching change along with the return of a former coach, and the end of an illustrious home winning streak that ended on the last day of the season. 

Despite all those trials and tribulations, the Bucs have a chance to write all those wrongs beginning this Saturday.  But it won’t be easy considering they will have to do so on the road, which has not been friendly for the Black and Purple Gang (0-5). 

Even more so it will have to be done so in the state of Georgia where not only the Bucs, but also both Louisiana clubs have struggled all year going a combined 0-6.  By virtue of the Columbus Lions 61-29 win over Lafayette last night, if the Bucs succeed Saturday and upset the Panthers they will have to travel back to Peach State and take on the Lions. 

Louisiana has shown times of brilliance but also times of inconsistency, none more so in their final regular season in which they surrendered a 20-point lead in route to a 31-30 defeat by the hands of their ‘I-10’ rivals in the Lafayette Wildcatters.  Another sign of inconsistency can be the Bucs lack of production the games final period, in inter-SIFL games Louisiana has been outscored 134-108 in the fourth quarter.

In the friendly confines of the Albany Civic Center, the Panthers have been untouchable going undefeated including a 43-35 win over the Swashbucklers back on May 15th.   In that match-up, which happened to be the head-coaching debut of Michael Warren, both clubs ended fairly even statistically.  Two late Panthers touchdowns, one at the end of third quarter and beginning of fourth, had the Bucs playing catch up for the entire fourth quarter.

In the following meeting, which happened the very next week in Lake Charles, Albany would be without a quarterback and Louisiana took full advantage grabbing three turnovers winning 67-43.  Louisiana’s offense rolled out 357 yards of total offense and marked the return of quarterback Freddie Harrison who connected on 21 of 41 passes for 326 yards and six touchdowns.

Louisiana travels to the Peach State to take on the Regular Season Champion Albany Panthers this Saturday night at 7:30 p.m.  Fans can track all the games scoring action by logging on to www.southernifl.com and following the live twitter feed.