LOS ANGELES, Jan. 3.—The Atlantic Windjammers scored twenty-four points in the first quarter. It was a magnificent beginning, marred only by the unfortunate circumstance that the game continued.
For three more quarters the Los Angeles Lunatics patiently took the afternoon apart, piece by piece, until a final-possession touchdown gave them a 30–27 victory. A club which had trailed 24–0 found the winning score. A club which had appeared to possess everything discovered that the one thing it lacked was the finish.
Fury Football has put only two official games into its founding-season book. Cleveland supplied the first victory yesterday. Los Angeles has supplied the first result that will require the telling more than once.
A quarter fit for a coronation
Chill Chellibek’s Atlantic side opened with a touchdown, then kept collecting three-point conversions. Four successful three-point additions turned the opening touchdown into an eighteen-point haul. When Atlantic’s defense subsequently forced Los Angeles backward for a defensive touchdown, the margin reached 24–0.
The Windjammers had scored with the ball and against it. Los Angeles had not scored at all. One could scarcely have drawn a more convincing opening statement without putting the opposition’s signature beneath it.
“At twenty-four to nothing, I thought we had bought ourselves a comfortable afternoon. It appears we had merely paid for the first quarter.”
Chill Chellibek, Atlantic coach · imagined postgame remarks
The arithmetic begins to change
Ed Safeley’s Lunatics answered in the second quarter with a touchdown and two successful three-point conversions. That brought twelve points, cut the deficit in half, and sent the clubs into the interval at 24–12.
Atlantic still held a substantial advantage. Yet its great opening rush had stopped producing points, while Los Angeles had found a way forward. The difference between an impossible chase and an uncomfortable lead was suddenly only a quarter’s work.
In the third, the Lunatics scored another touchdown. The conversion attempt failed, but the six points mattered enough: Atlantic 24, Los Angeles 18. The Windjammers’ first-quarter mountain had become a single touchdown’s climb.
“We could do nothing about the twenty-four they already had. We could do something about the next possession. That seemed a better occupation than feeling sorry for ourselves.”
Ed Safeley, Los Angeles coach · imagined postgame remarks
Six points—and a lead suddenly gone
The fourth quarter supplied a turn peculiar to Fury Football. During Atlantic’s possession, an offensive penalty gave Los Angeles the option to accept penalty points. The Lunatics accepted, received six points, and drew level at 24–24.
Those six points were a penalty award, not a touchdown. Atlantic retained the possession. But on the scoreboard, twenty-four unanswered Los Angeles points had erased every bit of the Windjammers’ opening advantage.
Atlantic did answer. The Windjammers advanced again and made a three-point kick on fourth down, restoring their lead at 27–24. Chellibek’s club had endured the comeback, found another score, and handed Los Angeles its last possession with the visitors still in front.
Herrera keeps the chase moving
The Lunatics’ comeback has a player’s name running through its middle: Herrera, No. 16. His eleven-space advance helped set up the second-quarter touchdown, and his successful conversion added three points. In the final possession, Herrera supplied a seven-space run before the winning pass. Across his two named regulation plays, he contributed eighteen field spaces.
Atlantic’s early conversion procession also included named contributions from Bailey, No. 6, and Cantrell, No. 1. Each supplied a successful three-point conversion. Their points remain part of the Windjammers’ excellent opening quarter, even after the final result changed its meaning.
The last possession belongs to Los Angeles
The Lunatics moved forward on two running plays, the second a seven-space advance from Herrera, then called a pass on third down. Daniels, No. 45, supplied the six-space passing result that carried Los Angeles across the goal line. It was the touchdown that put the Lunatics ahead for the first time all game: 30–27.
The ensuing conversion produced no gain. It changed nothing that mattered. Both clubs had used their four possessions; Los Angeles had used its last one to win.
After the first quarter, the Lunatics outscored Atlantic 30–3. They did not merely catch a team that had stopped moving. They also had to answer the Windjammers’ late kick, with their own chance running out. That final reply made the afternoon a victory rather than a valiant near miss.
Safeley’s Los Angeles club begins 1–0. Chellibek’s Atlantic club begins 0–1. The league book will record a three-point margin; anyone who watched its making will remember a much larger distance travelled.
The Windjammers won the first quarter by twenty-four. The Lunatics won the argument by three.