Talk about starting off with a bang.
The Fayetteville Mustangs made quite a splash in their inaugural game in the National Arena League.
Most expansion teams in any professional sports league usually take their lumps during that initial season.
Not the Mustangs.
The indoor football team went to Orlando on April 8 and not only won but set a league record for points scored in the opening week of the season. They beat the Predators 68-43.
“We shocked the league,” said owner Robert Twaddell.
True, it’s not the Predators team that won two ArenaBowl championships in the old Arena Football League that began in 1987 and ran for 22 years before folding in 2008. In fact, the Orlando team that kept the Predators name had a 3-9 record last season.
But the team still has a rich tradition in indoor Arena Football.
And 68 points is quite a feat, no matter the opponent.
The previous record of 66 points was set by the now defunct Lehigh Valley Steelhawks in 2017.
That’s the kind of splash Twaddell, a chiropractic physician who has lived in Fayetteville since 1996, hoped to make when he decided to bring indoor football back to Fayetteville.
“I really enjoyed arena football in years past,” Twaddell said. “I just wanted to bring it back to Fayetteville. I am the sole owner, so if anyone was interested in co-owning a sports team professionally, I would be welcome to that. I would like to have a small group of owners.”
The Mustangs are Fayetteville’s fifth entry in an indoor football league, following the Cape Fear Wildcats (arenafootball2, 2002-04); the Fayetteville Guard (National Indoor Football League, 2005-07); the Fayetteville Force (Southern Indoor Football League, 2011); and the Cape Fear Heroes (American Arena League, 2012-2019 with an off year in 2017).
Star players
The Mustangs also made quite an impression on their new league when the players won three of the National Arena League’s four player-of-the-week honors during the first week of the regular season.
Quarterback Rakeem Cato was the offensive player of the week after passing for 314 yards and seven touchdowns. Receiver Kendrick Ings was named the special teams player of the week after scoring three touchdowns, two receiving and one on a kickoff return. Tre Long was the Ironman Player of the Week after catching three TD passes as a receiver and returning an interception for a touchdown.
And now the Mustangs are set for their home opener at 3 p.m. Sunday at the Crown Coliseum. They will host the Jacksonville Sharks, which lost their season opener to the San Antonio Gunslingers, 63-62.
The Fayetteville band Rivermist will give a pregame tailgate party performance beginning at 12:30 p.m., and gates will open at 2, Twaddell said.
Single-game tickets range from $15 to $75. Season tickets for the seven home games range from $140 to $280 and are available at Fayetteville Mustangs.com.
Twaddell said a team promo will offer children free admission to the first two home games.
Season tickets specials include $99 for corner and endzone sections and $140 for center sections. Tickets must be purchased in advance at fayettevillemustangs.com/sportsfan. The offers expire Friday.
The season ahead
The National Arena League began in 2017 and features seven teams, including Fayetteville, The others are the aforementioned Predators, Sharks and Gunslingers; the Albany (New York) Empire; the Carolina Cobras (Greensboro); and the West Texas Warbirds (Odessa, Texas). Albany has won the last two championships.
The Mustangs play a 14-game regular-season schedule that ends July 29 with a home game against the Empire.
After his standout opening-game performance, quarterback Cato can’t wait for Sunday’s opener.
“It’s another tough Florida team. They’re going to come in and try to give us all their best,” he said. “We’ve just got to come in and match their energy and throw our best blows.”
Coach Charles Gunnings is not surprised by the Mustangs’ opening-week success.
“We’ve got some good athletes on my team who can make some good things happen out there,” said Gunnings, who has been a part of all of Fayetteville’s indoor league teams, starting as a player with the Wildcats in 2002.
“I’ve been here ever since,” he said. “It’s not my first rodeo. I’ve been here, like, 18 years.”
The opening game was special for Cato, who was Marshall’s starting quarterback from 2011-14, because he played for the Predators last season. The 31-year-old Cato finished his career at Marshall with a school-record 14,079 passing yards and 131 passing touchdowns.
“It was great watching my old teammates, watching my friends that I played with down there, watching my family that came to the game,” Cato said. “So, I was just trying to seize the moment, to take it one play at a time, one drive at a time. Just let my players play the game for me and not try to overdo myself and not try to do so much as the quarterback.
“We had a great camp coming in all three weeks, and we just had to translate it on the field on game day and we did.”
One game does not make a season, however, and coach Gunnings is taking nothing for granted.
“You can’t worry about last week,” he said. “You’ve got to build off it. You’re only as good as your last play.”
Arena football is played on a field sized to fit stadiums where ice hockey and basketball are played. The field is 50 yards long instead of 100, and the end zone is 8 yards deep as opposed to 10. The units on the field are smaller, too, with eight-man squads on offense and defense instead of 11. That necessitates many players going both ways.
That’s just the way Gunnings likes it.
“It’s actually football I grew up in, the Arena Football Ironman league. We have to go both ways to play,” Gunnings said. “You obviously have to play defense, so it makes you a true athlete in this league. You don’t necessarily have to be the best football player, but you’ve got to be a true athlete.”
Gunnings has found success coaching indoor football. He compiled a 28-10-0 record in his last coaching stint with the Heroes, including a 4-2 mark in the playoffs.
“I’ve won a lot. I’ve got, like, eight championship rings, so I’m not really searching for rings,” Gunnings said. “I know certain guys are. This is more about relationships with guys. That’s going to be the key when you go to war with somebody. You trust that person beside you. Just like anything, you’re going to fight hard for them, and that’s what we try to do.”
While he might not be in the trenches on the field, first-time owner Twaddell is fighting for his coaches and players in the front office.
“It’s been very challenging, all components of it, marketing it, getting the team ready,” said Twaddell, who was the medical director of the Heroes before taking ownership of the Mustangs. “Coach helped out with a lot of the coaching staff. All the coaching staff are local. They pitch in on recruiting and things like that.
“Being at the top of the league takes a lot of challenges, to get everything organized, all the equipment purchased, things like that. There’s a lot of expenses. But it’s very enjoyable.”
For many of the players, the ultimate goal is moving up to the XFL, USFL or even the NFL. Remember that Super Bowl-winning quarterback Kurt Warner went from the old Arena Football League to become an NFL Hall of Famer in 2017.
“This is when (players) try to get film,” Gunnings said. “Most of the ones who move up are specialists like receivers or (defensive backs). You very seldom see a big boy in the trenches move up because it’s 1-on-1 blocking. They’ve got to be in a scheme set for coaches to want to see them. Skill positions can definitely move up quick.”
Gunnings adds, “We’ve actually had a lot of guys from NFL come to us.”
For instance, Ings played for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Detroit Lions in the NFL, and Cato was briefly at mini-camp with the Browns.
But the immediate goal for the Mustangs is building on that opening-game victory, Twaddell said.
“We want to fill the stadium with great entertainment and look for a group of partners, business partners to promote their businesses who would be interested in bringing this to Fayetteville,” said Twaddell, who hopes to average at least 5,000 fans per home game this season. “I’m really looking forward to a successful season. Keep players healthy and bring that championship to Fayetteville.”