Grady & Rowley Set New AFL Pass TD Records

Andy Lopusnak
Sunday June 24, 2012

Click here to view game images taken by Andy Lopusnak of Kyle Rowley's record-breaking performance.

The AFL record book was rewritten Saturday night. Utah QB Tommy Grady set a new league mark for touchdown passes in a single-season (118) with three games remaining. A few hours later, Spokane QB Kyle Rowley became the first to toss 12 touchdowns in a game.

Both West Division passers had outstanding games in impressive wins for their teams. Grady was 25-of-28 (89.3% - highest in AFL this season) for 306 yards with eight TDs and no interceptions in the Blaze's 61-38 win over then South Division-leading Georgia. Rowley overcame an interception on his first pass to complete 30 of his next 36 passes for 392 yards and the record-breaking 12 passing scores as the Shock handed San Jose its first home loss of the season 90-63.

Grady reached his 118th passing touchdown on his final pass of the game with 14 seconds left. He hit receiver Jeremy Kelley on a 14-yard touchdown.

The win secured Utah (10-5) its first winning season in franchise history. It was Grady's seventh straight game with at least 300 yards passing. He also became the fastest player to reach 5,000 passing yards doing so in 15 games and needs 297 yards to pass the single-season record set last year by San Jose QB Mark Grieb. Utah has a bye this upcoming week and doesn't play against until July 6 when the team travels to Phoenix to play the West Division leading Arizona Rattlers. Grady likely will break the yardage mark that night. He is 25 completions and 63 attempts away from setting those marks. Here's a look at all six players with at least 5,000 passing yards in a single season.  

MOST PASSING YARDS, SINGLE SEASON - AFL HISTORY
RK	PLAYER, TEAM	YEAR	YARDS
1	Mark Grieb, SJ	2011	5,310
2	Chris Greisen, MIL	2010	5,139
3	Tommy Grady, UTAH	2012	5,104
	John Dutton, CLE	2010	5,104
5	Brett Dietz, TB	2010	5,037
6	Joe Germaine, UTAH	2007	5,033

Rowley hit his record-breaking twelfth passing touchdown with 2:40 remaining in the game when he connected with receiver Jeffrey Solomon on a 45-yard strike (click here to see a photo of his 12th TD). He attempted to go for his 13th with in the final seconds so the Shock could gain the playoff point differential tiebreaker over the SaberCats, but he barely overthrew receiver Rod Harper. If you take away his game opening interception and the final play incompletion, Rowley completed 30-of-35 (85.7%).

In Rowley's game, his counterpart for the SaberCats, Mark Grieb became just the third player in professional football history to record 900 passing scores doing so with his second of five touchdown passes in the game (click here to see a photo of his pass for 900). 

As a side note, 12 passing TDs did occur once in the af2. Brett Dietz tossed a dozen scores for the Louisville Fire on June 17, 2006. In the 86-66 win over the Ryan Vena led Albany Conquest, Dietz was 23-of-31 for 314 yards. Special thanks to David Harwood over at The Stat Guys for the af2 information.