The Salt Lake Screaming Eagles were a professional indoor football team based in

West Valley City, Utah West Valley City is a city in Salt Lake County and a suburb of Salt Lake City in the U.S. state of Utah. The population was 140,230 at the 2020 census, making it the second-largest city in Utah. The city incorporated in 1980 from a large, qui ...

, near

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the capital and most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in Utah. With a population of 200,133 in 2020, th ...

. The Screaming Eagles started as an expansion team in the

Indoor Football League The Indoor Football League (IFL) is a professional indoor American football league created in 2008 out of the merger between the Intense Football League and United Indoor Football. It has one of the largest number of currently active teams am ...

(IFL) and began play in 2017 with home games at the

Maverik Center The Maverik Center, originally known as the E Center, is a 12,000-seat multi-purpose arena located in West Valley City, Utah, United States. Construction on the arena started in 1996 and was completed in time to hold its first event on September ...

. The team folded when ownership left the IFL to start their own league.

History

The team was announced in April 2016 by a group called Project FANchise with the intent on creating an entirely fan operated indoor football team. The project announced that fans would vote on every aspect of the team including the name of the team, signing players, and calling plays. On June 6, the name of the team was announced as the Screaming Eagles after the

101st Airborne Division The 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) ("Screaming Eagles") is a light infantry division of the United States Army that specializes in air assault operations. It can plan, coordinate, and execute multiple battalion-size air assault operat ...

. The name was picked over the more controversial choices of " Teamy McTeamface," " Sandtroopers," and "Stormin'

Mormons Mormons are a Religious denomination, religious and cultural group related to Mormonism, the principal branch of the Latter Day Saint movement started by Joseph Smith in upstate New York during the 1820s. After Smith's death in 1844, the mov ...

." William McCarthy was voted in as the first head coach in franchise history. The team made their debut at home against the Nebraska Danger on February 16, 2017. They lost 78–47 in a game which featured the fans storming the field after the Eagles scored the first fan-called touchdown in franchise history. Also, the team introduced their part-owner,

Norm Macdonald Norman Gene MacdonaldThe capitalization of Norm Macdonald's surname has been inconsistently reported in publications such as ''TV Guide''. Books that discuss him, such as ''Shales'' (2003) and Crawford' (2000), as well as other sources such as ...

, who helped call part of the game streamed live on SI.com (

Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with circulation over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellence twice ...

) and

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second most ...

. The team won their first game the next week defeating the Colorado Crush 42–41 on February 26. On March 1, the team then fired head coach William McCarthy due to philosophical differences and then hired Matthew Sauk as its new head coach without using the fan vote system. However, the FANchise vote system made national news once again when their fans voted against signing former NFL player

Greg Hardy Gregory McKarl Hardy (born July 28, 1988) is an American former football defensive end, mixed martial artist and professional boxer who played in the National Football League (NFL) for six seasons, primarily with the Carolina Panthers. He playe ...

on March 30, 2017. On April 20, 2017, ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'' reported that Project FANchise was planning on launching a new league called the "Interactive Football League". Project FANchise CEO Sohrob Farudi confirmed that the Screaming Eagles would finish the 2017 Indoor Football League season and would be leaving the league afterwards. The league was later re-branded as the Electronic Football League (eFL) in October 2017 and then as the Fan Controlled Football League (FCFL) in November 2017. The new league planned to play all of its games in only one city with eight new teams and the Screaming Eagles did not appear to be one the team names considered. The new league eventually began play in February 2021 as

Fan Controlled Football Fan Controlled Football (FCF) is a professional 7-on-7 Indoor football league created in 2017 as the first sports league controlled by fans. All games are played at the Pullman Yards in Atlanta, Georgia and broadcast on Twitch, NBCLX, DAZN, Fub ...

with four teams.

Statistics and records

Season-by-season results

Head coach records

Personnel

Final roster

All-League selections

* WR Devin Mahina * DB James Calhoun

Individual awards

Staff

2017 season

Schedule

Key:

Standings

References

External links

Official website
{{2017 IFL season 2016 establishments in Utah 2017 disestablishments in Utah