Local franchise gets off on the right foot
QB Walker passes for 272 yards and 4 TDs as team wins debut game in new league
Houston scored the final 25 points of its inaugural XFL game to defeat the Los Angeles Wildcats 37-17 in front of 17,815 fans in attendance at TDECU Stadium on Saturday.
“I was proud of the kids for hanging in there,” Houston coach June Jones said. “We kinda were beating ourselves early in the game, dropping a lot of balls, missing some open guys, and you just got to make those plays.”
The Roughnecks (1-0) scored in just three plays on their opening drive when quarterback P.J. Walker found receiver Cam Phillips for a 50-yard touchdown over the top, less than two minutes into the game.
Under XFL rules, teams may not kick extra points. Instead they must convert for one, two or three points from two, five and ten yards out.
When Jones elected to go for one, a short run was stuffed.
“I said before the game that if we score the first touchdown, we’re going to go for one,” Jones said. “After that we just kind of stayed on the two going for it. I think it’s going to create (some) pretty interesting finishes to some games.”
The Wildcats (0-1) scored 14 points unanswered.
Quarterback Charles Kanoff scrambled to the left and stuck the ball out beyond the pylon to cap L.A.’s first drive with a touchdown then a two-point conversion to former Oklahoma receiver Jordan Smallwood.
Los Angeles punted and Kanoff was intercepted by linebacker Kaelin Burnett on the following two drives, but the quarterback found Smallwood to-wards the back corner of the en-dzone for a touchdown which put Houston behind 14-6 later.
Walker cut the deficit when he dumped the ball off to running back James Butler, who took the screen pass and burst past a pair of blockers into the endzone — although Houston failed to convert the two-point conversion.
Following Nick Novak’s 35-yard field goal for the Wildcats, Walker began Houston’s run when his 39yard touchdown pass put the Roughnecks ahead.
He escaped the pocket and found Sam Mobley in the end zone for the third of four touchdowns.
Walker was picked off once, but he completed 23 of 39 passes (59 percent) for 272 yards in the game. The third TD gave Houston an 18-17 halftime lead after Los Angeles failed to snap the ball for a field goal attempt from the 16-yard line as time expired.
“He’s learning the system, he did some really good things. I was kind of anxious to see him because I had played against him in college,” Jones said of Walker. “He did create a lot of stuff and that was his magic in college too.”
Houston dominated in the second half.
Receiver Kahlil Lewis scored on a short pass from Walker, who added two points after he slipped into the endzone on the ensuing conversion.
Cornerback Deatrick Nichols broke up a pass to Smallwood on fourth and eight, which helped set up Houston’s Sergio Castillo for a 44-yard field goal.
Nichols ended the next Wildcats drive when he picked off quarterback Jalan McClendon with just under 13 minutes remaining in the game.
Six plays later, Butler burst into the end zone from four yards away and Lewis caught the twopoint con-version to open a 20point lead.
In addition to its second-half shutout, Houston’s defense topped Los Angeles in most major categories including sacks (five to one), takeaways (three to one) and yards allowed (291 to 315).
“The defense came out in the second half and played really well,” Walker said. “I think they got us started in the second half. I think we just had to go out there and play off them, feed off they energy.”