There’s a full week ahead when it comes to indoor football across the four leagues that we cover. Ashle Norling has it taken care of in another edition of Indoor Football Weekly.
The Games (Home Team in Bold)
Champions Indoor Football
Amarillo Venom 88, Duke City Gladiators 62
Omaha Beef 48, Texas Revolution 34
Wichita Force 61, Oklahoma Flying Aces 34
Salina Liberty 51, Sioux City Bandits 49
Indoor Football League
Nebraska Danger 66, Cedar Rapids River Kings 42
Arizona Rattlers 63, Sioux Falls Storm 50
Iowa Barnstormers 61, Tucson Sugar Skulls 58
Bismarck Bucks 51, Quad City Steamwheelers 48
National Arena League
Massachusetts Pirates 45, Orlando Predators 12
My words betrayed me this week, a few weeks ago I touted the competitiveness of most CIF games and that really wasn’t the case this past week. Starting in the second quarter the Venom manhandled the defending champion Duke City Gladiators ending with a 26 point victory for Amarillo.
Omaha had a slightly more competitive game with Texas only winning by 14 but had defensive dominance shutting out the Revs in the 1st and 4th quarters. Wichita took the biggest win of the night, 27 points, against the hapless Oklahoma Flying Aces.
Last up in the CIF was Sioux City/Salina, a game that ended in weird fashion when the Liberty QB Andrew Jackson threw a pass that the Bandits Henry Livingston picked off but lost the ball before he hit the ground. Easy call that should have been an incompletion but was called intercepted by the officials with 11 seconds remaining. The oddities didn’t stop there as Bandits QB Dillon Turner was sacked by Salina’s Travis Taylor with 6 seconds left on the clock to give the Liberty a W.
The IFL on the other hand had two and a half fairly competitive games that started out with Nebraska owning Cedar Rapids the entire first half en route to a 24 point win. Arizona would outscore Sioux Falls 37-21 before having a dogfight in the second half leading to a 13 point Rattlers win.
In Tucson the Sugar Skulls held the defending Champion Barnstormers down for three quarters, leading 31-20 at the half and 37-20 in the middle of the third quarter. Tucson couldn’t hold on and gave up 34 points in the fourth to the high powered Iowa offense who took the game by 3 points.
Last up in the IFL was a game that I personally thought was a safe bet as the Steamwheelers traveled to Bismarck to take on the Bucks. The Bucks kept the game close the entire night and with 6 seconds left (seems to be a good time to win a game last week) Bismarck QB John Gibbs hit Eric Lauderdale with a 25 yard TD pass to not only win but put the Bucks on a 2 game winning streak.
On the NAL front our own Brandon Russell did a great recap of the Pirates/Predators game that you can check out here.
Quick Hits
In the CIF kicking off on Friday Night it’ll be the battle of the bottom (of the North) as Sioux City (1-3) looks to break a two game losing streak against Wichita (2-4). Saturday sees three games in the CIF starting with Salina (3-2) looking to extend their winning streak to three games hosting defending Champion Duke City (3-2) who also looks to break a two game skid.
Omaha (3-1) travels to Enid, OK to take on the Flying Aces (0-4) in an attempt to keep themselves at the top of the Northern Division, while Oklahoma will look to gain it’s first win in franchise history over a very good Omaha Beef team.
In the Indoor Football League all 10 teams will be in action this week and all will kick off around the same time. Arizona (8-0) hosts Nebraska (5-4) at the Talking Stick Resort Arena in Phoenix. The Danger are pushing for a playoff spot in the last half of the season and a win would much help while the Rattlers will defend their unbeaten record and the Snake Pit.
The Green Bay Blizzard (5-3) host the Bismarck Bucks (2-6) at the Resch Center on Saturday night. Bismarck will head into GB looking for a third straight win for a team that two weeks ago was 0-6. Green Bay on the other side looks for win number six, which will tie the most wins they’ve had (2015) since they went 11-3 back in the 2012 season.
The third and final game of the 2019 Iowa Bowl series finishes up in Des Moines on Saturday night as the hometown Barnstormers (7-1) take on their arch rival in the Cedar Rapids River Kings (1-8). In the two earlier games the River Kings gave the Barnstormers a scare in almost beating them before dropping the game in the 4th quarter each time. This time they look to get over the hump in Des Moines. The Barnstormers haven’t been the most polished team this year but always come out with a strong second half and look to keep winning at home where they play 5 of their final 6 games.
In Moline, IL the Quad City Steamwheelers (3-5) host the Sioux Falls Storm (6-2) on $2 Beer night. The ‘Wheelers look to give the QCA something to cheer about as massive flooding has wreaked havoc on Downtown Davenport, IA across the river. Knowing the how the Storm are, especially after losing, the Quad City fans will probably need a lot of those $2 beers.
Last up is an 8PM kickoff between the Tucson Sugar Skulls (3-5) and the San Diego Strike Force (1-7) in Tucson, AZ. Sugar Skulls fans are not happy with a no call on the play that Iowa won the game on last weekend and the team will attempt to redeem themselves from that. San Diego on the other hand, well head coach Burt Grossman probably doesn’t give a f*** about what happens.
The CIF games can be caught on Pluto TV while the IFL and NAL games are available on YouTube.
