Time to celebrate AFL's finest 24 hours

Adam Markowitz
Sunday August 23, 2015

I'm not really an "I told you so" type of guy, but I told you so.

We just experienced what might have been the best 24-hour period in Arena Football League history. Four epic teams fighting for two spots in ArenaBowl XXVIII, and even right down to the last few moments of both games, it would've taken a brave man to try to predict what combination of clubs would ultimately be headed to the title game.

Alas, the answer to that question ended up being the Jacksonville Sharks and the San Jose SaberCats, and they'll meet in next weekend in Stockton to be named the 28th champion in league history.

But my, what a ride we had to get there!

70-67. 61-56.

The only time in AFL history we had two closer games in the semifinals was when Tampa Bay and Spokane moved on to ArenaBowl XXIII with wins totaling just four points. That Storm game against the Predators came down to the last kick of the football, one which fell literally feet short for Orlando which would've forced overtime. The Shock were never threatened in spite of their 60-57 victory over Milwaukee.

The semifinal games in 2005 were the only ones rivals to these. Orlando came a two-point conversion on the last play of the game short of tying Georgia up to send that game to overtime, while Colorado won the infamous "Confetti Bowl" over Chicago in a game which did go into an extra frame.

The only set of semifinals with more combined points than these two? 2001 when Grand Rapids helped the case by hanging 83 on San Jose to cap two semifinal games which totaled 271 points.

But even all those games didn't have all of this.

This was the epic rivalry (Arizona/San Jose) and the score to settle (Jacksonville/Philadelphia).

This was a team on the road to being dubbed the best team in AFL history (San Jose) and a team in the middle of a dynasty (Arizona).

This was a man who has all of the stats but has always come up just short in the big time (Tommy Grady) and the man who is rewriting all of the record books (Nick Davila).

This was a city which craves championships more than any other in sports (Philadelphia) and a city which has never had a competitive game played in it in AFL history (Stockton).

This was the ref's call you'll remember for the rest of your life (Reggie Gray's last touchdown which may or may not have been a fumble) and the call you'll never remember almost changed the course of history (Julian Rauch's kick which may or may not have been good).

This was the coach who came home (Darren Arbet) and the one who honored his another legend, his old man (Les Moss).

This was about games which were never separated by more than 14 points for 120 minutes of heart-stopping action. This was about every mistake being magnified. Every pass. Every catch. Every block. Every tackle. Every score. Every kick. Every stop. It all mattered. Every single moment of it.

And it was awesome.

The AFL got it wrong so many times this year, and it was so frustrating. We the fans know that. And they know that, too. Heck, I couldn't even get a straight answer from anyone as to where and when the ArenaBowl was going to be played as late as 2:00 AM last night.

And all of that sucked. But all of this is awesome.

There will be plenty of time to question how many teams there will be in the league next year, and there will be plenty of time to analyze all what went wrong and could go wrong in the future.

But for all of the bellyaching we have all done as fans about all of what the AFL has done wrong, especially for the last six years – and goodness knows that I'm at the front of that line! – it's time to recognize that what we just saw is why we love this quirky little 50-yard indoor game and why we're all grateful that it came back after its 2009 hiatus. Because no matter how strong the league has ever been or ever will be, we may never have a 24-hour period like we just had.

Just like I told you.

Onto the ArenaBowl. See you in Stockton.