Florida Celebrates First Decade of Arena Football
Keith Antigiovanni
Thursday March 22, 2001
The Pittsburgh Gladiators changed their name and moved south in 1991 to become the Tampa Bay Storm after four seasons in Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, the Orlando Predators joined as an expansion club during the same season. From the first game, Orlando wanted to show that they were not an expansion pushover by defeating the Storm in Tampa Bay 51-38 on the opening day of the 1991 season.
"That first game I don`t think our coaches understood what they were doing,” remembers Jay Gruden, then the starting quarterback for Tampa Bay. “We were playing against Reggie Collier, a scrambling quarterback. Our coaches didn`t want to rush him so we kept him in the pocket and he picked us apart. You can’t give anyone that much time."
 Coincidentally, Jay Gruden has been a part of every Florida team`s Arenabowl win. Image courtesy of Drew Kennedy |
Tampa Bay went on to avenge the opening day loss with a win in Orlando but there was clearly a rivalry in the making. Tampa Bay leads the regular season series 12-10 but the competition reached new heights in the 1995 and 1998 Arena Bowls when the two clubs squared off. Tampa Bay won 48-35 in Arena Bowl IX but was blasted by the Predators 62-31 at home as Orlando went on to capture its first Arena Bowl championship.
Other than the fierce rivalry between these two, the overwhelming aggression has spilled over against the rest of the league as both teams have dominated the AFL for the past decade. Tampa Bay has posted a league-best 94-32 record, while Orlando owns the third-best record at 86-40. Both teams have also dominated in the post-season combining for 6 Arena Bowl titles (Tampa Bay 4,Orlando 2) and 11 Arena Bowl appearances (Orlando 6,Tampa Bay 5).
"There’s no doubt that we have the greatest rivalry in the AFL,” says Gruden, “There’s a lot of competition between these two cities and our rivalry with Tampa Bay really brings that out.”
Keith Antigiovanni is a free-lance writer in San Diego, California. He has worked for several local newspapers covering sports, government and business. Keith started writing in 1995 after graduating with a Bachelors Degree in Mass Media Communications from the University of San Diego. Aside from working as a sportswriter he has a side business of providing marketing assistance/research for small businesses and also directs,produces and hosts a regular public access television show on Time-Warner Cable named "San Diego Yesterday". Antigiovanni is also a member of the San Diego Sportswriter Association.
