For the second straight game to open the 2009-2010 Kraft Family IFL regular season, it looked as if an Israel Bowl finalist from last year may suffer an embarrassing defeat at the hands of an expansion franchise playing its first real game.

Ultimately, for the second straight game, the only victory the newcomers were able to take home came in the moral variety.

On Saturday night in Modi’in, Israel, the host Dancing Camel Pioneers got their title defense off to a winning start by overcoming an eight point fourth quarter deficit against the first-year Beersheva Black Swarm to ride off into the moonlight with a hard-nosed 20-14 victory to follow the Big Blue Jerusalem Lions’ dispatching of the Judean Rebels on Thursday night in a tight 32-30 affair.

Tal Brown orchestrated consecutive scoring drives in the final frame and the Dancing Camel ground game found its legs as both Kobi Nimrod and Ehud Drory pierced the endzone while combining for 104 yards on 16 carries. Meanwhile, the defense played an extremely disciplined game – not being whistled for an infraction in the entire second half – as Dan Brunwasser’s squad demonstrated that despite losing reigning IFL MVP Asaf Katz to the IDF as well as a number of other key components from the championship-winning roster, it will not allow itself to exhibit even one ounce of post-Israel Bowl complacency that so often follows a title season.

Nonetheless, it was a courageous Game One showing for Beersheva, which dominated the time of possession and was in front for the majority of the game. Rookie quarterback Sager Patel was clearly the offensive sparkplug for the expansion club, completing 8 of 16 passes and gaining 97 yards on just 13 carries on the ground, including a TD.

Moreover, it was definitely much more than a one-man show for the Swarm, who had an IFL-record 20 players record tackles on the defensive side. If it was not for the 90 yards in penalties the team took, the outcome may have looked a little different. Even so, the Swarm had ample opportunity to win the game, even getting a fortuitous chance in the final minute to tie, or even win, the game after a Drory fumble granted Beersheva a possession in the Modi’in zone. Unfortunately, Patel’s only mistake of the game would result in a Shmuel O’Neil interception and quash all hopes for a comeback.

The match was a nail-biter throughout, with the teams never separated by more than one score as the Swarm showed, even while losing, that they will not be bullied around in their inaugural campaign by the IFL big boys. The new team from the South opened the scoring just before the half and held a 14-6 lead going into the final frame before Dan Brunwasser whipped his team into shape just in time. Five minutes later, however, Brown and his running backs had given the hosts a lead they would not relinquish.

There were number of noteworthy performances from both sides in Saturday’s contest, between Brown and the Pioneer backs to Patel and Amit Benvenisti with his 10 tackles from the Swarm. However, the player who stood out the most with his contributions in all aspects of the game was Dancing Camel’s Jason Gosnel. The 32-year-old from Denver is no stranger to IFL accolades, having set the league sack record last season. This year, though Gosnel has taken on a larger role on the offensive side of the ball as well, and the experiment paid dividends in the very first game, with the supremely athletic big man recording the only sack of the night among his seven tackles on defense, as well as hauling in a 13-yard touchdown pass just before half-time to knot the score and get his team on the board. His all-around effort earns him Mike’s Place Player of the Game honors.

The match was not without sideshow drama as well, with a disputed safety call midway through the third quarter that, luckily, did not at all impact the final result of the match. However, the pervading theme of the evening was one celebrating the seeming emergence of league-wide parity in the Kraft Family Israel Football League, which should make for a real treat of a season all around.

With the IFL hierarchy still intact – at least for now – the action is back on the field this week, as the rest of the teams in the seven-team league open their campaigns. On Friday at 10 a.m., in Yoqneam, the
Real Housing Haifa Underdogs host the newly-backed Papagaio Jerusalem Kings, while on Saturday night at 8:30 p.m., the Mike’s Place Tel Aviv Sabres take on the Pioneers in the first tackle football game to be played at the Hapoel Tel Aviv training fields, next to Wolfson Hospital in Holon.

See full game stats.