Tag: San Antonio Brahmas

Former Wisconsin Badger falls short in UFL Championship

Former Wisconsin Badger falls short in UFL Championship

The first UFL Championship game took place on Sunday with the Birmingham Stallions besting the San Antonio Brahmas 25-0, winning their third straight title.

Former Wisconsin Badgers safety Scott Nelson, a member of the Brahmas, logged a tackle in the loss. Nelson was able to compile 22 total tackles over 12 games during the season with San Antonio.

The safety was a member of the Badgers from 2018-2021, recording 127 total tackles, including a sack, while intercepting four passes over 29 games. He went undrafted in the 2022 NFL Draft and has spent time with the Seahawks, Steelers, Lions and Texans.

As for the winners of Sunday’s contest, head coach Skip Holtz was able to lead Birmingham to a third championship in a row and the first-ever UFL title (the first two were pre-merger USFL titles).

Former Badgers rival quarterback Adrian Martinez (Nebraska, 2018-2021) won the game’s MVP award after posting 98 passing yards and a score through the air while also adding 52 yards and two touchdowns on the ground.

Former Notre Dame receiver wins UFL championship with Birmingham

Congrats, Kevin!

Former Notre Dame receiver [autotag]Kevin Austin Jr.[/autotag] hasn’t seen his NFL dreams pan out yet. After a stint with the Jacksonville Jaguars that passed without him ever playing in an official game, the time came to look elsewhere. That turned out to be the UFL’s Birmingham Stallions, who won the championship in St. Louis with a 25-0 shutout of the San Antonio Brahmas, the franchise’s third straight title.

Austin played a decent role in the Stallions’ championship season. He had 15 receptions for 253 yards and two touchdowns. It culminated on a disappointing note with three targets and no receptions in the final game. Still, the season wasn’t bad for someone who hadn’t played competitive football in three years.

It’s hard to tell where Austin’s football career goes from here. Maybe the NFL comes calling again, or maybe, the UFL is where he’ll make his mark on his sport. Regardless, here’s hoping he has more achievements ahead.

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How to watch and stream the UFL championship game on Father’s Day

The San Antonio Brahmas (8-3) will face the Birmingham Stallions (10-1) in the UFL championship game this afternoon. Here’s how to watch.

The San Antonio Brahmas (8-3) will face the Birmingham Stallions (10-1) in the United Football League’s 2024 championship game at The Dome at America’s Center in St. Louis on Sunday, June 16.

The UFL championship game will be nationally televised on Fox and available to stream on fuboTV (try it free). Kickoff for the UFL title game is scheduled for 3:00 p.m. MT (5:00 p.m. ET).

Twenty-three former Denver Broncos players suited up in the UFL this season and seven of them have reached the championship game. Meanwhile, the Brahmas are coached by Wade Phillips, who won Super Bowl 50 as a defensive coordinator with the Broncos in 2015.

Phillips’ squad includes tight end Cody Latimer, who was a rotational receiver in Denver when the Broncos won the Super Bowl in 2015. Latimer has hauled in 36 receptions for 391 yards and one touchdown this season.

After the UFL season wraps up on Sunday, players can begin signing with NFL teams as early as Monday. Last year, 92 players were signed following the USFL and XFL seasons (those leagues have since merged to form the UFL).

Two years ago, Denver signed long snapper Mitchell Fraboni after he stood out in the USFL. Fraboni remains the team’s long snapper going into the 2024 campaign. We’ll see if the Broncos land any more spring football talent after the UFL season concludes this weekend.

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Ex-Broncos DC Wade Phillips coaching for UFL championship on Sunday

Wade Phillips and the San Antonio Brahmas will attempt to upset the Birmingham Stallions in the UFL championship game on Sunday.

Twenty-three former Denver Broncos played in the United Football League this spring, and one former Broncos coach patrolled the sidelined.

Wade Phillips — who served as a defensive coordinator in Denver from 1989-1992, as a head coach from 1993-1994 and as DC again from 2015-2016 — is now the head coach of the San Antonio Brahmas in the UFL.

The Brahmas will face the Birmingham Stallions in the UFL championship game on Sunday afternoon. Birmingham is seeking its third-straight title while Phillips is aiming to win a championship for the first time as a head coach.

The 76-year-old Phillips won a Super Bowl as a coordinator with the Broncos, but he’s never won a title as head coach. The veteran coach deflected the spotlight off himself and onto his players earlier this week.

“Obviously it’d be great,” Phillips said, via Jack Marrion of the Houston Chronicle. “But I feel great for the players. They’ve worked really hard for it. They deserve to be where they are now. I think they deserve a championship but they have to play it and win it.

“We beat a team that hadn’t lost a game in two years. Now we just beat a team that hadn’t lost a home game. And I believe we’ve been the underdogs in every game, so we like playing that role.”

Phillips is still a beloved coach in Broncos Country and on social media — he went viral earlier this season — and many fans in Denver will be backing the Brahmas on Sunday. San Antonio (8-3) will aim to upset Birmingham (10-1) at 3:00 p.m. MT on June 16.

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Former Wisconsin safety to appear in 2024 UFL Championship Game

Former Wisconsin safety to appear in 2024 UFL Championship Game

Former Wisconsin safety Scott Nelson will represent the San Antonio Brahmas in the 2024 UFL Championship game on June 16.

Staged at the Dome of America’s Center in St. Louis, Missouri, the title game will determine the champion of the 2024 UFL season. The USFL Conference winner, the Birmingham Stallions, will square off against the NXL Conference victor Brahmas.

The match will mark the first-ever UFL Championship after the XFL-USFL merger, which occurred prior to the 2024 campaign. The Stallions own both the 2022 and 2023 USFL titles while the Arlington Renegades captured the 2023 XFL championship.

Following a successful high school football tenure at University of Detroit Jesuit, Nelson represented the Badgers for five seasons at safety. Following a redshirt freshman season in 2018, Nelson appeared in at least one contest for four consecutive seasons with UW.

The Detroit, Michigan native graduated in 2020 with 127 tackles, 11.0 TFLs, 1.0 sack, 4 interceptions and 16 pass breakups in 28 starts at safety. He was named a consensus All-Big Ten honorable mention after starting all 13 matches at safety and posting 60 tackles.

In San Antonio’s conference title game, Nelson registered six tackles in a 25-15 upset victory over the St. Louis Battlehawks on June 9. He recorded 27 tackles on the year prior to the postseason triumph.

Former Rams DC Wade Phillips leads Brahmas to UFL Championship game

Wade Phillips is heading to the UFL Championship game as the head coach of the San Antonio Brahmas 👏

Wade Phillips is a legend of the coaching world, having spent more than 50 years on the sidelines throughout his career – including high school, college and the NFL. He’s also been a coach in the XFL and UFL in the last two years, so his experience is certainly wide-ranging.

At the age of 76, Phillips is still getting the job done. On Sunday, he led the San Antonio Brahmas to a 25-15 win over the St. Louis Battlehawks in the XFL Conference Championship Game, punching their ticket to the UFL title game next weekend.

It’s the first time Phillips will be the head coach in a league championship game, which shows how long he’s waited to potentially win his first title as a head coach. He did win a Super Bowl with the Broncos as their defensive coordinator and he reached Super Bowl LIII with the Rams while leading their defense, but this is new territory as a head coach.

The Brahmas will face the Birmingham Stallions in the UFL Championship next Sunday, June 16, at 5 p.m. ET.

Phillips was the Rams’ defensive coordinator from 2017-2019, spending three years on Sean McVay’s staff. He was a big part of McVay’s first few years in the NFL as a head coach, helping guide the young coach and manage the defense, while McVay primarily focused on building one of the league’s best offenses.

Brahmas spoil Battlehawks’ hopes for home UFL Championship Game

The San Antonio Brahmas are XFL Conference Champions in the UFL

The stage was set. The St. Louis Battlehawks had to defeat the San Antonio Brahmas on Sunday and they would play at home in the UFL Championship Game against the Birmingham Stallions.

The Brahmas had other ideas and played the role of party-wreckers, downing St. Louis, 25-15.

San Antonio is the XFL Conference Champion and will face the Stallions on June 16 in St. Louis.

The crowd of 30,237 at the Dome at America’s Center was muzzled early when the Brahmas took a 19-3 lead.

The Battlehawks then scored two touchdowns in 13 seconds and the place was rocking.

However, St. Louis was unable to score again and San Antonio got a pair of field goals to seal the victory.

Former Penn State RB John Lovett currently leading UFL in rushing

Could a former Penn State running back be the MVP of the UFL this season? John Lovett is making his case!

His time in Happy Valley may have been brief, but [autotag]John Lovett[/autotag] has certainly been performing admirably in his professional football career. Lovett is currently leading the UFL, the merged league between the XFL and USFL, in rushing yards entering Week 7 of the league’s debut season. And that has him squarely in the running to be considered the UFL’s most valuable player.

Lovett has rushed for 348 yards this season for the San Antonio Brahmas through the first six games of the season. He is one of two running backs in the league to have rushed for at least 300 yards this season, with former Nebraska and Kansas State quarterback Adrian Martinez being the other (Martinez is the quarterback for the Birmingham Stallions). On a league-high 74 rushing attempts, Lovett has also not fumbled the football once this season.

Despite the Brahmas coming up short in their last game against the DC Defenders, Lovett rushed for 153 yards on 23 attempts and caught a touchdown pass. Heading into the weekend, Lovett currently sits just four points shy of the UFL’s scoring lead with 34 points scored. Lovett will be a big reason why the Brahmas clinch a spot in the UFL playoffs as they look to compete for the XFL conference title for a chance to win the inaugural UFL championship.

RJ Young of Fox Sports currently has Lovett ranked fourth in his UFL MVP power rankings. He is probably a bit of an outside shot to win the league’s MVP award behind the previously mentioned Martinez and former Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron (St. Louis Battlehawks), but Lovett is in the mix for sure.

Lovett came to Penn State out of the transfer portal from Baylor following the 2020 season. After spending four seasons with the Baylor program, amassing 1,803 rushing yards and 17 rushing touchdowns, Lovett took on a scaled-back role at Penn State and was hampered at times by some injury concerns. He appeared in 9 games for the Nittany Lions during the 2021 season and rushed for 177 yards.

Lovett played on the practice squad for the Carolina Panthers in 2022 and spent a training camp with the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2023 before being released prior to the start of the NFL season. His showing in the UFL will likely help him stay on the radar for some NFL teams in search of running back depth in 2024.

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Brahmas stun Showboats with two late TDs in UFL play

The Brahmas overcame a 16-0 deficit to stun the Showboats

The San Antonio Brahmas improved to 2-0 in the UFL with a dramatic, 20-19, victory over the Memphis Showboats on Saturday.

With less than a minute left and trailing 16-8, Chase Garber threw a TD pass to Jontre Kirklin.

The three-point attempt failed and San Antonio trailed 16-14.

However, the Brahmas used a UFL rule that allows teams to choose a fourth-and-12 play rather than attempting an onside kick.

The pass play was successful and it set up Garber finding Cody Latimer with three seconds left to give San Antonio the victory

Defenders lose to Brahmas in UFL debut

The Defenders drop their UFL opener.

The D.C. Defenders were one of the XFL’s top teams when it was revealed the XFL and USFL would merge in 2024 into a new league called the United Football League (UFL).

The Defenders, the Arlington Renegades, the St. Louis Battlehawks, the San Antonio Brahmas, and the Houston Roughnecks are five of the eight teams in the UFL that transferred over from the XFL.

On Saturday, the UFL debuted with two games. On Sunday, there were two mores, one of which featured the Defenders against the Brahmas. D.C. was 9-1 in 2023 — the XFL’s final season — before losing in the championship game.

Unfortunately for the Defenders, this season didn’t begin as well as their final XFL season, as San Antonio dominated D.C. 27-12 in a battle of former XFL teams.

San Antonio quarterback Chase Garbers was excellent, completing 19 of 25 passes for 158 yards and two touchdowns in the win. The University of California graduate spent parts of two seasons with the Raiders on their practice squad and offseason roster.

For the Defenders, quarterback Jordan Ta’amu returned for another year. Ta’amu completed 25 of 45 passes for 235 yards and an interception. He was with D.C. last season and has had multiple NFL stints on offseason rosters.

The Defenders did not score a touchdown, and kicker Matt McCrane connected on four field goals in the loss. McCrane booted field goals of 50, 34, 48 and 28 yards.

The Defenders return home to Audi Field next week and host the Roughnecks in another battle of former XFL teams. The Roughnecks also dropped their UFL debut.