The Iowa Barnstormers handled the Green Bay Blizzard easily in the first meeting between the teams this season, but on Saturday Iowa needed a 12-point comeback to earn a victory. Quarterback Travis Partridge and wide reciever Javicz Jones showed to be leaders in Iowa’s 12-point comeback win.

Travis Partridge, Javicz Jones Emerge as Leaders in 12-point comeback win

The Comeback

Iowa improved to 4-2 on the season and maintained third place in the United Conference.

“At the end of the day, every win is huge,” Barnstormers Coach Dixie Wooten said. “But, a come-from-behind win is big-time.”

The Barnstormers found themselves trailing the Blizzard 26-14 with 10:17 to play in the game following Partridge’s lone interception of the night.

Iowa stopped the Blizzard on a fourth down attempt before Keshaudas Spence scored a touchdown to cut the lead to five.

Nonetheless, Green Bay still had a five-point lead with 5:30 to play in the game.

The Barnstormers defense came out big yet again, and stopped Green Bay on four downs.

On the next drive, Partridge ran for seven yards on back-to-back plays before finding Brady Roland for the go-ahead touchdown.

One of the cornerbacks that covered Roland was getting in his face for a portion of the game. Roland at one point shoved him to the ground. As he caught the ball and ran into the end-zone, he turned around running backwards, staring at Green Bay’s receiver.

“He was a tough competitor,” Roland said. “That’s what makes the game fun – competition. It is frustrating, [but] you’ve just got to keep your head. My time came, I did what I had to do for the team, and we won.”

Cornerback DaeJohn Love, who was coming off an injury sealed the game with an interception.

“This league is really cut throat,” Love said. “You have to keep a strong mindset and always be willing to take advantage of your opportunity, and that’s what I did tonight.”

Where it All Began

The drama that set up the comeback started with 5:30 to play in the third quarter when the Barnstormers were down by five.

On third down, the Blizzard ran a designed rushing play to quarterback Jarred Evans. The play would be called back for holding, but would be wrongfully called as a second down.

Partridge Voices His Opinion

Partridge even came out onto the field to let the officials know.

“That’s my job, that’s something that you should do as a leader. I have built a relationship with those referees,” he said. “They know I’m not coming from a place of anger, they know I have an issue that I am bringing to them.”

Wooten said that it said a lot about Partridge.

“When the quarterback is stepping up for [the defense] that shows a lot,” Wooten said. “By him being motivated to step up and understand what he is doing for his guys, others look up to him as a leader.”

While all of the confusion is being sorted out, both teams were trash-talking each other and nothing productive was made out of it. The call remained a second down for Green Bay, and the Blizzard scored shortly after.

Nothing was going right for Iowa, and on the defensive side of things, Jones was the voice that stepped up.

Love said Jones is a leader, and the defense hears him over anything.

“I just told them it was time to step up,” Jones said. “It’s a close game and it’s on us to make sure we do our part of the game. [We needed to] make sure everybody was keeping their minds together, and making sure all the little things didn’t matter. Right now, football matters.”

What Jones said seemed to work for the team, as they rallied back to earn a 27-26 win.

Partridge added that overcoming adversity is the kind of team that fans in Iowa will see this year.

“When our backs are against the wall, we’re going to scratch and claw,” Love said.

Main Photo Credit: Connor Ferguson, Last Word on Sports