Another one’s in the books. SWARCO RAIDERS Tirol have kept their winning streak intact and steamed over Kragujevac Wild Boars in CEFL Bowl XII. The visiting team kept pace in the first quarter but the rest of the game was mostly lopsided. In front of 3500 fans at the Tivoli stadium, Raiders’ quarterback, Sean Shelton engaged the defense in a public display of affliction and won the MVP award.

The Wild Boars got the ball first and went straight to their playmakers. Their snap-caller Dalton Oliver, in his fourth game with the team, threw for first downs to Strahinja Stepović and Stefan Đurić. The drive was promising but the team was too jittery, committing three penalties that backed them off and they had to punt.

Shelton got a hold of the ball and immediately poke holes in the porous coverage. Just two of his projectiles to Simon Unterrainer and Adrian Platzgummer were good for 61 yards. Sandro Platzgummer advanced the ball near the goal line and Shelton took it home himself.

Oliver got the ball back and aimed it at his bigest targets, Stepović and Filip Nedeljković, who each came down with a couple of grabs. Running back Laurent Tshimanga carried the rock to move the chains, and Oliver finally broke the plain for a 2 yard score.

From then on the Wild Boars just couldn’t find terra firma. On three consecutive drives Shelton distributed the ball to his open receivers, rushing for short gains himself. Touchdowns resulted with passes to Fabian Abfalter for 4 yards and Alexander Nitzlnader for 40 yards. A rocket to Kyle Callahan turned into a 51 yarder and a flick to running back Tobias Bonatti into an 8 yard touchdown.

The Wild Boars tried to push back, but struggled to find their rhythm. They were plagued by the lack of discipline, with players jumpy on offense and grabby on defense. Their incoherent play through much of the first quarter left them in a deep ditch by the end of it, 27-7.

After the intermission the Raiders picked up where they left off. Shelton kept employing his receiving corps for short gains and Bonnatti picked up the slack on the ground, ending the drive with a 14 yard pitch and catch touchdown.

This time the Wild Boars answered. First play in their following drive was a screen pass from Oliver to Tshimanga, who stretched his legs and dashed down the field for a 63 yard score. However, the shot play left no time for their defense to rest and they were quickly overwhelmed.

Shelton marched down the field again, airing it out to Callahan at the end for a 10 yard score. Oliver replied with a long ball to Allen Ramsey, but the offense stalled again and the Wild Boars went for the fourth down that misfired. Shelton lost no time, completing a 31 yard pass to Unterreiner, then calling his own number for a jog into the end zone on a 29 yard touchdown.

In the next Wild Boars’ offensive series Oliver had nothing to lose and took his shots. His missiles found Ramsey and Đurić for combined 62 yards and he caped it off with a 7 yard score to Stepović.

The Raiders ate the clock by handing it off to Bonnatti, who was unstoppable for 62 yards from 3 plays and they knocked on the rivals door again. Putting an end to the drive Shelton crowned his stellar performance with a 3 yard pass in the end zone to Daniel Saurer. Time expired quickly after that and SWARCO RAIDERS won the CEFL Bowl trophy for the first time with a resounding 55-20 on the scoreboard. Sean Shelton’s 7 deadly spins landed him the game MVP award.

He was overjoyed after the game: “I’m very happy with the way I played and the way the offense operated… We operated very well even late into the play clock and I’m very proud of my guys… This title means a lot. Any time you win an international championship among national champions and you go 3-0 facing champion after champion, you got to be proud about that… You got to have the utmost respect for the Wild Boars. To travel here and compete the way they did, you have to tip your cap to them. They came out and scored on the first drive and then they never really went away. They’re an extremely tough team and I think, worthy of being here.”

Raiders head coach, Shuan Fatah also praised his team: “We lost half of our team from last year and we opened a new chapter. I told the young guys: ‘You’re writing your own chapter now. The old guys are gone and you’re taking over.’ This is the first time that they had a chance to win the title, hopefully one of many. They responded greatly… It was a tough tournament. We had to go to Poland and play a great Polish team, we played against a Danish team right here and they gave us all the fits… It’s a tough tournament and [considering] our situation we didn’t know how [good] we’re going to be. To win it – is awesome! It’s great feeling, it was a big goal for us this year and we accomplished it and we got to look for the next one… It’s very important for our approach to the whole thing. We want to win international titles. We want to play the best of the best and this tournament presented us with some really, really good teams and I’m very happy we just managed to do that. It’s important for our club. We played a who-is-who and nobody has a schedule like we do. We had no off weeks, we’re walking where very few walk, and we’re very proud of that.”

Wild Boars’ head coach, Aleksandar Ristić sees a silver lining in the loss: “We made so many mistakes and that was a problem. This was a really tough game for us. We wanted to see where our team is right now because the Raiders are so highly ranked in Europe. So this was a really good test for us to see if what we’re doing is good, how our program is doing, can we play with these guys. I’m satisfied with the game but I’m not satisfied with the score. I like to say that I don’t mind losing, but it’s the way that I lose. This game showed us a lot and the great thing is that we’ll learn a lot from it.”