First-place Bay Area came to Prescott Valley Saturday night to take on Northern Arizona. After both teams missed field goals on their opening drives, the Wranglers’ Ramone Atkins hooked up with Arland Bruce IV, who made a highlight reel catch to put them on the board.
Then a couple of former NAZ players pushed the Panthers into the lead. Axel Perez had a field goal, and Josh Jones — who was the IFL Rookie of the Year with the Wranglers last year — threw two TD passes. But Atkins had a rushing touchdown and chucked another TD pass to Bruce to give Northern Arizona the 18-17 lead at halftime.
In the second half, Atkins had another touchdown run and threw a scoring pass to Deshon Stoudamire to give NAZ the 30-23 lead. The Panthers, however, put up 18 unanswered points to get the 41-30 victory.
The Wranglers are now 1-12 on the season.