ALBANY — The Albany Empire beat the odds merely by fielding a team for Saturday night’s game, a feat that was in doubt Tuesday afternoon.
That the Empire (1-3) even came close to a win, losing 41-38 to the West Texas Warbirds (1-3), was its own kind of victory, according to lineman Cornelius Lewis.
“It’s a moral victory because I don’t think nobody expected us to come out and play like we did. Nobody expected the game to be that close with guys just being here for two days. I don’t think anybody was expecting that from us at all,” Lewis said.
Albany suspended eight top players, including quarterback Sam Castronova and 2022 National Arena League MVP wide receiver Darius Prince, and head coach Damon Ware last Monday following issues over lack of payment and an incident on the team bus that led to kicker Michael Hall filing a police report.
Tom Menas, who won back-to-back NAL championships in Albany, agreed to return to the team Tuesday and held his first practice Thursday with about a third of the team present. Of the 21 players active for Saturday’s game, 10 joined in the past week.
“It’s been challenging, and the effort that the kids put in is incredible,” Menas said. “Everything they did was heroic. It really was. Because who else could do what we just did? We showed up.”
Down by one point in the fourth quarter, Albany’s defense held up at their own 1-yard line, tacking West Texas’ Trevante Coleman short of the end zone on three straight plays.
“I think that came back to our effort. We had great effort out there. I think that’s where most of our defensive stops came from,” Lewis said.
The offense took advantage: Quarterback Roland Rivers aired out a 41-yard touchdown pass to Keyshawn Young to give the Empire their first lead of the game at 37-32 with just over seven…
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