Week 4 (5/15/99): Albany vs Buffalo

'Birds' Brown on fire

ALBANY - With "Touchdown" Eddie Brown, you get to pick your poison.

The Buffalo Destroyers opted for a nice, slow demise Saturday night, taking away the deep ball but giving up the territory underneath the coverage.

So Brown and the Albany Firebirds took what was given them, and defeated the Destroyers, 51-41, as Brown tied his team record for receptions in a game with 15 for 190 yards and four touchdowns; he also had a rushing touchdown.

"That's why he's Eddie Brown," Firebirds quarterback Mike Pawlawski said. "He's just a great receiver. He comes up with big plays when he has to, he does all the right things. Just like anybody else, he's not perfect all the time, but when he plays football, boy, he's something to watch. He's pretty special. I guarantee you, there's nobody else in this league I'd rather have as my offensive specialist. When you're that good, they put a `Touchdown' on your name."

"He's one of the greatest we've seen in this league year in and year out, and I thought we did make a few plays on him here and there, but certainly, as he's done so many times, he made more plays," Buffalo coach Dave Whinham said.

The Firebirds improved to 3-1 to keep pace with New England in the Eastern Division, and Buffalo fell to 0-3.

Pawlawski completed 29 of 45 passes for 367 yards, 190 to Brown, who fell eight yards short of his single-game receiving yardage record.

It was all a matter of "settling" for the short stuff, which the Firebirds were content to do.

"They were just staying high [with their coverage]," Brown said. "They weren't going to give us the 40- and 50-yard bombs. They just gave us 20, 25 here and there. In the beginning, we were just running to where they were playing us."

The announced attendance for the Firebirds' home opener was 12,011, but the crowd was closer to about 10,000.

The fans reserved their biggest roar for a fourth-and-five for the Destroyers from the Albany 10 with less than two minutes left.

Buffalo quarterback Tony Kimbrough appeared to have a receiver open in the right corner of the end zone, but the ball whizzed through Melvin Phillips' hands.

The Firebirds took over and killed the rest of the clock.

"We've been tough to stop, but the real encouraging thing is that we stopped them when we needed to," Firebirds head coach Mike Dailey said. "Early on it snowballed, but then Buffalo buckled down and got in a position where all of a sudden it's a new game."

The Firebirds could do no wrong in the first quarter, taking a 16-0 lead after 3:38 had elapsed and closing the quarter with a 23-6 lead.

But the Destroyers got back in it and trailed by just three points early in the fourth quarter.

Then the Firebirds marched 45 yards and scored on an eight-yard pass to Brown, and Albany withstood a long drive by Buffalo that ended in an incomplete pass through the hands ofMelvin Phillips in the end zone on fourth down with less than two minutes left.

Pawlawski was flawless in the first quarter, going eight-for-eight for 120 yards and three touchdowns as the Firebirds piled up a 23-6 lead.

But he cooled off in the second quarter as the Destroyers climbed back into it.

The game wasn't even four minutes old, and the Firebirds led, 16-0, on touchdown passes to Jay Jones and Eddie Brown and a safety by Tim Brown, who tackled kick returner Derek Holloway in the end zone after the first touchdown.

Van Johnson plucked a Pawlawski pass off his shoetops for another Firebirds touchdown late in the quarter.

Albany was finally stopped when Pawlawski was sacked and Don Silvestri missed a 28-yard field goal early in the second quarter.

But they got it back deep in Buffalo territory when Destroyers kicker J.J. Phair inexplicably tried a pooch kick from 54 yards that landed in Carl Sacco's hands at the Buffalo 20. Sacco returned it to the 15, and Pawlawski hit Brown on the next play for a touchdown and a 30-9 lead.

But Albany sputtered from there as Pawlawski started missing the mark, and he didn't get much help from his receivers.

Jones dropped a pass in the end zone on third down, and Silvestri missed the ensuing field goal attempt.

Then Holloway beat Jones on the next play, and Buffalo quarterback Tony Kimbrough hit Holloway for a 45-yard score with a half minute seconds left in the half.

The Firebirds had enough time to work the ball from their own five to the Buffalo two with 3.4 seconds left, but defensive back Antoine Worthman made a nice play to break up a pass to Brown in the end zone as the half ended.

Buffalo wasted no time tying it up in the second half, using four plays to drive 30 yards for a nine-yard pass to Darrick Branc