Cavalry stampedes past New Mexico


By Eric Maddy
The SCORE

If Gen. George Custer would have had this kind of cavalry, Sitting Bull would have been wiped out at the Little Big Horn.

Undefeated Wyoming rode into Rio Rancho and easily earned its ninth victory of the season in the American Indoor Football Association, routing New Mexico 67-32 Saturday night.

The Cavalry scored on all but its last two possessions, including touchdowns on its first two plays. Wyoming rolled to a 43-12 halftime advantage over New Mexico at halftime, leaving the only question of how big the margin would be in doubt before intermission.

Playing before the smallest crowd of its initial season, New Mexico got a bad omen when it fell behind before any time ran off the clock as Wyoming kicker/quarterback Matt Strand booted the open kickoff through the upright for a one-point “rouge.”  The Cavalry’s domination was so thorough that it scored four times on its first play from the line of scrimmage to start a series.

The Wildcats tried to keep the game close in the first half. New Mexico, which was shut out until the final 30 seconds in a loss to Arizona on Tuesday, got two first downs on the opening drive but quarterback Ronnie Simpson was sacked on fourth down, losing eight yards.

On the first play from scrimmage, Strand hit B.J. Charlton on a deep touchdown throw, and then connected with Arthur Ireland on a two-point conversion pass. Less than five minutes in and New Mexico trailed 9-0, a hole the Wildcats could never climb out of.

That hole got even deeper after the next series. Two bad snaps, a problem that plagued New Mexico against Arizona, reappeared, including a 16-yard loss on fourth down. That left Wyoming at the Wildcats’ 3, and the Cavalry’s Johnnie Young charged home with a rushing touchdown but couldn’t convert on the two-point attempt, leaving the score at 15-0.

After that, the teams began to trade scores. New Mexico capped a five-play drive with a 1-yard touchdown run by Dwayne Davis to narrow the margin to 15-6, but Arizona came back to score on a three-play drive to make the margin 15 points again at 21-6. The Wildcats then used a two-play drive to pull within 21-12, with  Simpson hitting Darren Haliburton on consecutive plays, the score coming from 11 yards out. Another failed conversion left the score at 21-12 with 12 minutes left in the half.

The New Mexico defense, which had played well in the past two weeks, couldn’t shut down Wyoming, however. The Cavalry continued to score, while the New Mexico offense slowed.

 Wyoming got scoring passes of 11 and 38 yards from Strand to open up a 35-12 advantage with 3:30 left in the half. And after Simpson was intercepted by Tanner Terault on the first play of the next series, Wyoming overcame a tripping penalty with a 15-yard gain on a Statue-of-Liberty run by James Jones to score once more before half on a Strand to Dante Dudley 12-yard TD pass with 5.2 seconds left.

The second half was more of the same. New Mexico had its first two drives killed by a sack and fourth-down incompletion, then by an interception, before scoring the third time it had the ball. A fourth drive also ended with an end-zone interception before Simpson scored on a 1-yard run with just over a minute left.

Wyomng, meanwhile, scored four touchdowns on scoring passes of 23,27, 2 and 40 yards from Strand on its first four possessions of the second half before fumbling the quarterback-to-center exchange on its final series with less than a minute remaining in the game. That set up a Simpson to Haliburton 4-yard TD for the final New Mexico score.

Wyoming was more successful on its next driving, using two running plays to end the game.

Will be updated with final statistics and quotes.