The Georgia Force played their first game on the road against the West Texas Desert Hawks in the first Southern Conference matchup of the season. The Desert Hawks held serve at home with a 51-28 win over the Force.

Going into today’s bout, most everybody had it chalked up as a West Texas victory. While they did come away with the win, they did not look very clean in the process. Most everything was clean, but the recurring issues were mishandled snaps and penalties. There seem to be some timing and formation issues that the Desert Hawks just could not clean up; that will likely be the focus of practice this week. Otherwise, West Texas looked pretty good. 

The offense was relentless, and everybody got to touch the ball. Jonathan Bane did well at multiple levels of the field, ending with four passing touchdowns; three of those touchdowns would go to Lonnie Outlaw. Outlaw would likely have more, but he was ejected following his second unsportsmanlike conduct penalty of the game.

The West Texas scoring was aided by the defense and the special teams. Georgia scored first to start the game, but their kickoff fell into the hands of Sean Coyne who housed it from a yard deep in his endzone. The defense helped by getting a safety off of a blocked field goal as well as an uno. 

The West Texas special teams utilized the dropkick after touchdowns. The dropkick gives two points compared to one from a normal PAT. The Desert Hawks converted the dropkick a little under fifty percent of the time. 

The Georgia Force might have come up with 28 points, but it was difficult and not pretty. The Force is simply not a polished team. They had many difficulties with production on both sides of the ball– formation issues, penalties, timing issues, and issues with being on the same page. Kivan Taylor’s lack of experience was held against him today as well. He is not ready now, but perhaps over the course of the season, he will be able to figure out the Arena. 

The impact players from West Texas are Lonnie Outlaw and Justin Alexandre. Lonnie dominated his matchups and his production would have continued if his time on the field had not been cut short. Justin Alexandre was a terror on the edge today, coming away with several sacks and applying pressure every play. 

The impact player from the Force is Seantavius Jones. Jones got the game started for the Force with a touchdown after busting the Desert Hawks’ coverage. 

Other big plays include two interceptions for West Texas from Chris Page and one from Kenny Veal.

Demarcus Sweat would go out with an injury on the first play and not return.

The West Texas Desert Hawks (1-0) will face the Orlando Predators (0-1) in Orlando.  The Southwest Kansas Storm (0-1) head home next week to take on the Iowa Rampage (1-0).