Like the bus they took to last week's game at Camp Verde, the Paradise Honors Panthers broke down in a thudding 21-14 loss.

Now it's playoff time or bust.

“Every game is a playoff game from now on and that’s how we have to treat it,” said quarterback Clayton Duzy. “We have to play four quarters of football from the first kickoff to the last whistle of the game and if we’re not willing to do that… other teams are going to beat us.”

However, Brown said he feels good about his team’s output in practice this week and is confident for Friday night’s matchup agaimst Sedona (0-6).

“I think we’re really prepared this week,” said Brown. “Sedona’s a little bit of a different team. They run a different offense, they’ve got some athletes… but I think they’re ready.”

For Paradise Honors, it’s also the homecoming game.

And for players like transfer-senior running back Daishawn Davis-Mays, it’s his last hoorah.

“I think we’re going to come out and put on a show, because this is our last homecoming game,” said Davis-Mays after practice on Thursday. “We want to go out with a bang.”

The Panthers are ready.

“I’m confident in the team. I’m confident in my brothers,” said Duzy. “All we’ve got to do is flip the switch… and I know we can do it.”

Fresh on the heels of a statement win against the Parker Broncs two weeks ago, the Panthers failed to flip the switch at Camp Verde.

The team was confident. They were ready to add a third straight win to their schedule and move above the .500 mark.

And then, on the hour-and-a-half drive to the game, Paradise Honors’ charter bus broke down in the middle of nowhere on Interstate 17.

“We were on the side of the 17, sitting on a hot bus, and we showed up late,” Paradise Honors head coach Duane Brown said. “So then at that point, I think, honestly, they had just lost focus.... We had a really sloppy, really ugly game.”

At the end of the night, the Panthers (2-3) dropped what (to them, at least) should have been an easy win.

It was a game which Duzy reiterated Brown’s feelings of having no focus.

“It’s exactly what it was when we played Santa Cruz and exactly what it was when we played ALA,” Duzy said. “We got off the bus and we did not want to play football… none of us wanted to play.”

The story of the game for Paradise Honors was negative penalty yards, which according to the junior hurler, was the main reason the offense couldn’t get rolling.

“We would drive on that team for 40 yards and go back 50,” he said. “It was one step forward, two steps back the entire game and as soon as we built momentum, someone would make a mistake.”