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We almost lost to Japan?
Cold, Hard Football Facts for August 24, 2007
By Jonathan Comey
Cold, Hard Football Facts minister of foreign travel
An American all-star football team needed overtime to beat Japan?
What?
On July 15, America took part in the third-annual IFAF World Championship football tournament in Japan. It's like a World Cup of gridiron football rather than the regular around-the-world variety.
We missed this event – hell, let's be honest, we had no idea it existed – until last night, when NFL Network ran a replay of the title game between the U.S. and Japan.
We clicked past the NFLN hoping to find exhibition football (we're desperate) and instead saw a score that read USA 20, JPN 20 (OT). Once our scotch-addled brain cleared, we realized what we were looking at – an American football team in danger of losing to Japan in some type of international tournament.
Japan!
There were, of course, extenuating circumstances. The game was in Japan, for one, and the Japanese team was the cream of the Japanese crop – the winner of the first two IFAF world titles, neither of which the U.S. participated in.
Our "All-Stars" ( click here to see USA football's official site) were a bunch of recently graduated seniors with no sniffs from the NFL, mostly small-college guys. Good players in college, but nothing more. The starting quarterback, Adam Austin, was a backup for Arizona in 2006 – he played in seven games and threw 116 passes. And this was the face of the U.S. team.
Obviously, the goal in having the U.S. play in the tourney for the first time was to see how the world stacked up against our Single-A-level football players.
Still, this was football, American football, so how could any reasonable team lose? This team of super-scrubs beat South Korea 77-0 in its first game of the tournament, and that seemed about right.
Who could touch us?
Japan, as it turned out, the second-best football-playing nation in the world. Actually, the U.S. team needed a fourth-quarter comeback just to force OT.
Watching the game, it wasn't easy to figure out who to root for – after all, we Americans love the underdog. And the Japanese team was brimming with energy and hope – for Japanese football, this would be their Miracle on Ice.
But it wasn't to be. Japan failed in the second of two college-style overtimes, and the U.S. kicked the winning field goal to win 26-23. The Americans all piled up at midfield for an over-the-top celebration, and the announcer correctly wondered whether it was out of happiness or relief.
Check out the official Japanese website of the tournament, all written in fractured English like this: "Japan came in this tourney with a mixed feeling of gutsy spirit for the third straight championships and pressure as it would play on its home soil. But the Toshiaki Abe-led squad successfully advanced to the championship game crushing France and Sweden with ascore of 48-0 in both contests, removing the oppressive feelings."
Ah, Japan. You still have a ways to go. But keep trying.
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