The 2016 Arena Football League season was the 29th season in the history of the

Arena Football League The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 season, making it the third longest-running professional football league in ...

. Prior to the start of the season, the league contracted to eight teams. The 16-game regular season then began on April 1, 2016 and ended on August 1, 2016. The league, however, kept its eight-team playoff format, which meant that every club qualified for the postseason.

League business

Teams

The Las Vegas Outlaws and the

New Orleans VooDoo Louisiana Voodoo (french: Vaudou louisianais, es, Vudú de Luisiana), also known as New Orleans Voodoo, is an African diasporic religion which originated in Louisiana, now in the southern United States. It arose through a process of syncretis ...

were dropped from the league at the end of the

2015 File:2015 Events Collage new.png, From top left, clockwise: Civil service in remembrance of November 2015 Paris attacks; Germanwings Flight 9525 was purposely crashed into the French Alps; the rubble of residences in Kathmandu following the Apri ...

season because new ownership groups could not be found for either team. The

Spokane Shock The Spokane Shock were a professional indoor American football team based in Spokane, Washington, that played their home games at the Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena. The team was initially a member of arenafootball2 (af2), the Shock won divisio ...

jumped to 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 amon ...

on September 1, 2015. The AFL claimed ownership of the Shock name, forcing the team to rename itself the

Spokane Empire Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Canadi ...

. On October 30, 2015, the league announced that there would not be any expansion teams for the 2016 season; this event occurred just under three hours before what had been slated to be the expected announcement of an expansion franchise in San Antonio to be owned by the ownership group of the

San Antonio Spurs The San Antonio Spurs are an American professional basketball team based in San Antonio. The Spurs compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Conference (NBA), Western Conference Southwest Division ( ...

. The group owning the 2015 league champion

San Jose SaberCats The San Jose SaberCats were a professional arena football team based in San Jose, California. The SaberCats had been members of the Arena Football League (AFL) since 1995 (the year in which the team was founded); and until 2015, they belonged to ...

returned the franchise to the league on November 12, 2015 for "reasons unrelated to League operations". Commissioner

Scott Butera Scott C. Butera is an American businessman and entertainment and hospitality executive who is best known for being the CEO at various casinos in the United States. He was the commissioner of the Arena Football League (AFL) from September 2014 to M ...

said the league would try to find new ownership, but this was not forthcoming in time for the team to operate during the 2016 season to defend its championship. Because the league was now down to eight teams for the 2016 season, there were still the American and National Conferences but no divisional play. The

Cleveland Gladiators The Cleveland Gladiators were an arena football team based in Cleveland, Ohio, United States, and members of the Arena Football League (AFL). The Gladiators played their home games at Quicken Loans Arena, which they shared with the Cleveland Cava ...

were moved to the National Conference to maintain a balance between the conferences. The league took over operations of the former Portland Thunder in January 2016 and rebranded it as the

Portland Steel The Portland Steel were a professional arena football team based in Portland, Oregon and members of the Arena Football League (AFL). The team started as the Portland Thunder, joining the AFL in 2014 as an expansion team along with the Los Ang ...

. The 2016 schedule was announced on December 10, 2015.

ArenaBowl Playoffs

All teams from both conferences qualified for the playoffs. As in the prior season, there were the Conference Semifinals, the Conference Championships, and

ArenaBowl XXIX ArenaBowl XXIX was the championship game of the 2016 Arena Football League season. It was played between the American Conference Champion Philadelphia Soul and the National Conference Champion Arizona Rattlers. The game was played at Gila River A ...

. In the American Semifinals, the Soul beat the Storm 63–41 in

Allentown, Pennsylvania Allentown (Pennsylvania Dutch language, Pennsylvania Dutch: ''Allenschteddel'', ''Allenschtadt'', or ''Ellsdaun'') is a city in Lehigh County, Pennsylvania, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. The city has a population of 125,845 as of the 2020 United ...

. The Sharks beat the Predators 69–68 in

overtime Overtime is the amount of time someone works beyond normal working hours. The term is also used for the pay received for this time. Normal hours may be determined in several ways: *by custom (what is considered healthy or reasonable by society), ...

; the National Semifinals saw the Rattlers beat the Steel 84–40 and the Gladiators beat the Kiss 56–52 in

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United States ...

. The Rattlers doubled up the Gladiators 82–41 in the National Conference title game. In the American Conference title game, the Soul edged the Sharks by a score of 55–50. The Philadelphia Soul upset the heavily-favored Arizona Rattlers 56–42 in ArenaBowl XXIX in

Glendale, Arizona Glendale () is a city in Maricopa County, Arizona, Maricopa County, Arizona, United States, located approximately northwest of Downtown Phoenix. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it had a population of 248,325. History In the la ...

League business

Teams

ArenaBowl Playoffs

Alignment

Regular season standings

Playoffs

Conference semifinals

Conference finals

ArenaBowl XXIX

All-Arena team

References