Coaching for Pizza: Another Wild Weekend of American Football All Over the Globe

Sat. & Sun., June 22-23, 2024

Lots of American football happenings to report from this sunny, warm weekend in Camarillo.

This is the main reason that I love

coaching American football

Awards season has begun . . .

Varese Skorpions Head Coach

Nick Holt

Has been named the IFL's

2024 Coach of the Year

A well deserved honor in my opinion in getting a young team through several close calls to an 8-1 season.

The Catania Elephants were

in a Italian DIII/9FL South

Conference Championship Game

#21 is Catania DB Christian Di Mauro

in this second pre-game poster

Christian was a hard hitting Free Safety for us when I coached in Catania in 2008 and 2009. That makes him at least a 17 year veteran of the Italian football wars. I know for sure that he was not a rookie back in 2008.

YIKES!

A third pre-game poster for the

Elephants-Crusaders Conference

Championship Game

No Contest in an all island game

The Elephants (8-0) from Sicily easily defeated the Cagliari Crusaders (7-2) squads from Sardinia.

One more game for the

South Conference Champions

The Trento Thunders (8-0) had an easy

time with the Castelfranco Cavaliers (7-1)

Now, as North Conference Champions

the Thunder also have one more game

The Nine Bowl XXIV on

July 5th in Ravenna

The Catania Elephants (8-0) vs. the Trento Thunders (8-0) should make for a great DIII/9FL National Championship Game.

The Italian DII Semifinals were

also played this weekend

The Ferrara Aquile (9-1) cruised by

the Brescia Bengals (7-2) in one Semifinal

The second DII Semifinal was

played on Sunday

The Savona Pirates (9-0) had a hard

time with the Modena Vipers (6-4)

Silver Bowl XXX will be played

in Ravenna on July 6th

This DII National Championship Game between the Savona Pirates (9-0) and Ferrara Aquile (9-1) should also be top notch.

Ravenna in two weeks will be a great spot for American football fans in Italy.

Next Saturday, June 29th, Ravenna will be hosting the IFL DI National Championship Game, Italian Bowl XLIII.

#2 Seed Firenze Guelfi (7-2)

vs.

#4 Seed Parma Panthers (7-3)

This one will be a physical confrontation between two clubs that like to run the ball more than most Italian clubs.

I had an interesting exchange today . . .

As you may recall, we are planning

on heading south of the Equator

for this tournament

Mendoza is one of Argentina's main wine producing regions and sits at the eastern base of the Andes Mountains.

As it turns out, one of my Facebook friends is Enrique Fernando Catalá who happens to be the Head Coach of Argentina's Team Sudaca and this tournament's chairman.

Enrique sent me more information . . .

. . . on the tournament's two pods

for group play

When I told him that we were coming to Mendoza for the tournament he immediately offered to host us for one of Argentina's famed parillas, think meat ubermania BBQ, combined with several bottles of Mendoza's equally famous wines. He also said he would get us hotel rooms for us and our traveling companions, Koreen and Brian FitzGerald, at the tournament's group rates.

Laurie and I said, SI!

In return, I offered to help him recruit more teams for an additional Women's Flag Football Tournament to be played in Mendoza at the same time.

It seemed like a fair trade to me.

The French DII National Championship

Game occurred on Saturday

French DII National Championship result

Grenoble Centaures - 28

Villepinte Diables Rouges - 13

In the Netherlands . . .

. . . the Amsterdam Crusaders advanced

to play the Rotterdam Trojans in the

Belgium Netherlands League's

BNL Bowl 3 in two weeks

The BNL is pragmatic in calling their title game BNL Bowl 3 not BNL Bowl III.

There was a nice schedule of

games in the UK this weekend

Germany is CRAZY about

American football

Week #5 of ELF Play

with only six games on tap

The Barcelona Dragons with

a great pre-game poster!

It was not enough for the

Dragons (2-3) to beat the

Milano Seamen (2-3)

Tirol Raiders (4-1) with a solid win

over the Helvetic Mercenaries (0-4)

The Stuttgart Surge (4-0) with a good

win over the Munich Ravens (2-3)

It looks like the Vikings are

going to vanquish the Lions

They did, the Vienna Vikings (5-0) had

no problem with the Prague Lions (0-5)

The Wroclaw Panthers (2-3) with a

much needed win over the

Fehérvár Enthroners (0-4)

In a close one, the Rhein Fire (4-1)

edging the Berlin Thunder (2-3)

All of the ELF's Week 5 Results

West-Best with four winning teams
Central-Solid with only one 0-4 club
East-Least with only one winning team

Madrid will need to play well

this week to stay in this elite group

European League of Football Week #6

Saturday, June 29, 2024

Barcelona (2-3) at Tirol (4-1)

Wroclaw (2-3) at Vienna (5-0)

Rhein (4-1) at Madrid (3-0)

Fehérvár (0-4) at Milano (2-3)

Sunday, June 30, 2024

Helvetic (0-4) at Stuttgart (4-0)

Cologne (1-2) at Paris (2-1)

Berlin (2-3) at Prague (0-5)

Hamburg (2-1) at Frankfurt (1-2)

Week #6 ELF BYE

Munich (2-3)

The Rhein Fire (4-1) at Madrid Bravos (3-0) game is the only match up of major interest to me.

IFAF U20 Tournament Schedule

In Edmonton, Canada the eight country IFAF U20 Mens Tackle World Championship Tournament started on Saturday.

The four top seeded teams all won their first round games in convincing fashion.

#4 seed Austria easily dispatched
#5 seed Canada's "B" team as expected

#3 seed Japan drubbed
#6 seed Australia

Oh my . . .
#2 seed USA over #7 seed Panama

Oh my goodness . . .

#1 seed Canada's "A" team boat

raced #8 seed Brazil

To be clear, I will be the Brazil Onças MENS National Team Special Teams Coach in a tournament in São Paulo in December, not to be confused with Brazil's U20 squad.