Soul Look To Continue Roll Saturday In Jacksonville

By Matt Leon

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The Philadelphia Soul will take their 13-2 record down to Florida this weekend for a Saturday night match-up with the Jacksonville Sharks.

The Soul beat Cleveland last weekend, 72-56, in a game that wasn't really as close as the final score would indicate. The Soul led 65-34 with under six minutes left, but the Gladiators the outscored them 22-7 the rest of the way.

"After a bye week, it's easy to come out and play sloppy and we didn't," Soul head coach Clint Dolezel tells KYW Newsradio. "(For) 58 minutes we played lights out and then the last two minutes (we) played like I expected us to to start the game. But we just kind of lost focus there. Thought we had the game in the bag, which we did, but that's not the point. We've got to finish teams. There's going to be games where we're close like that and we can't have that lapse."

Listen to the entire interview with the Soul's Clint Dolezel

With three regular-season games remaining, Philadelphia has already clinched the East Division title and the best record in the American Conference. But Dolezel says they still have work to do.

"We've got a goal to host this thing for the (Arena Bowl) championship and we've got to hold serve," Dolezel says. "San Jose and Arizona on the other side (National Conference) are doing a great job with their records as well, so we've got to keep playing hard and obviously we've got to get through the playoffs to make that happen. But I like where we're headed."

On Saturday, the Soul will match-up with a 7-7 Jacksonville team that them one of their two losses, 55-47, back on May 16th in Florida. The Soul won the other meeting between the two sides in Philadelphia on April 12th, 63-52. Dolezel expects a tough football game this third time around.

"Any time you play in their arena, they've got the rounded end zones, they've got a hostile crowd, probably one of the better crowds in the league," Dolezel says. "And they've got great talent. I mean before the season started, they were projected to go to the Arena Bowl right off the bat, just because of talent alone. Hasn't worked out for them like that, but we know with what they have there, they can strike at any moment."

Philadelphia and Jacksonville will kickoff at 7:00pm on Saturday.

You can follow Matt on Twitter @mattleonkyw.