The Chicago Knights were a professional indoor football team based in

Loves Park, Illinois Loves Park is a city in Boone and Winnebago counties in the U.S. state of Illinois. Most of the city is in Winnebago County, with a tiny sliver in the east located in Boone County. The population was 23,996 at the 2010 census, up from 20,044 in ...

. The Knights were founded in 2010 as a member of the

Continental Indoor Football League The Continental Indoor Football League (CIFL) was an indoor football league based along the Midwestern United States region that played nine seasons from 2006 to 2014. It began play in April 2006 as the Great Lakes Indoor Football League (GLIF ...

(CIFL), playing their home games at the

Victory Sports Complex Victory Sports Complex is a multi-purpose arena, in Loves Park, Illinois, just outside the city of Rockford. Opening in 2007, the VSC became home to the Rockford Victory in 2008, when the team announced that it would be playing in the Ultimate ...

. The Knights were the third Indoor Football Team based in

Northern Illinois Northern Illinois is a region generally covering the northern third of the U.S. state of Illinois. The region is by far the most populous of Illinois with nearly 9.7 million residents as of 2010. Economics Northern Illinois is dominated by th ...

. The

Chicago Rush The Chicago Rush were a professional arena football team based in Rosemont, Illinois Rosemont is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States. Located immediately northwest of Chicago, as of the 2010 census it had a population of 4,20 ...

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 ...

were based in Rosemont, and the

Chicago Slaughter The Chicago Slaughter were an American professional football team based in Hoffman Estates, Illinois. Having been inactive since 2013, the franchise was a part of the CIFL from 2007 to 2009, winning the championship in 2009. The Slaughter joined ...

of 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 ...

are based in

Hoffman Estates Hoffman Estates is a village (Illinois), village in Illinois, United States. The village is located primarily in Cook County, Illinois, Cook County, with a small section in Kane County, Illinois, Kane County. It is a suburb of Chicago. Per the 2 ...

. The Knights replaced the Chicago Cardinals as the Illinois-based CIFL team, which had replaced the Slaughter after they left for the

after a dispute with CIFL management.

Franchise history

2008-2009: Milwaukee Bonecrushers

The Milwaukee Bonecrushers were a team in the

. They played their home games at the

U.S. Cellular Arena The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The Bonecrushers were Milwaukee's second indoor football franchise, following the Milwaukee Mustangs of the

. The franchise made an immediate splash in Milwaukee when it announced former

Green Bay Packer The Green Bay Packers are a professional American football team based in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the National Football Conference (NFC) North division. It is the thi ...

Gilbert Brown Gilbert Jesse Brown (born February 22, 1971) is a former American football player. A nose tackle who played for the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (1993–99, 2001–03), Brown played 125 Packers games (103 starts) recording 2 ...

signed a three-year contract to be the team's first head coach. However, the optimism quickly faded when Brown announced he was resigning from the position after just three games on April 8, 2008. Much of the team's staff and many of the team's players also left at the same time, raising eyebrows among the Milwaukee media and fans. The Bonecrushers finished 2008 with a hodgepodge of players and coaches, winning just one game, a 51-46 road contest against the

Muskegon Thunder The West Michigan ThunderHawks were an indoor football team based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The team was most recently a member of the Indoor Football League. From their inception in 2007 until 2009, the ThunderHawks were known as the Muskegon ...

featuring a 26-yard touchdown by Bonecrushers' quarterback Brian Ryczkowski with seconds left to set up a 1 yard game winning TD run by Ryczkowski on the final play of the game. The rumored reasoning behind the exodus of many of the original members of the franchise was the team's inability to pay its bills or personnel. This was confirmed when a judgment was entered against the Bonecrushers in favor of Challenger Industries, the company that sold the team its game field

AstroTurf AstroTurf is an American subsidiary of SportGroup that produces artificial turf for playing surfaces in sports. The original AstroTurf product was a short-pile synthetic turf invented in 1965 by Monsanto. Since the early 2000s, AstroTurf has m ...

, in the amount of $29,539.29 on October 15, 2008. Challenger resolved its claim against John Burns, one of the owners of the Milwaukee Bonecrushers, prior to the matter going to trial. The Bonecrushers returned to action in 2009 with renewed optimism after signing LeRoy McFadden, brother of NFL player

Darren McFadden Darren McFadden (born August 27, 1987) is a former American football running back. He played college football for the Arkansas Razorbacks and was selected by the Oakland Raiders in the first round with the fourth overall pick of the 2008 NFL Dra ...

, as its new head coach, as well as the previous year's CIFL Offensive Player of the Year, Randy Bell. However, McFadden also chose to resign after just three games, leaving assistant coach, John Burns, to take over as head coach. The Bonecrushers survived the 2009 season in Milwaukee with minimal attendance and finished 3-8. Prior to the 2010 season, the Bonecrushers management reorganized and the team elected to cease operations in Milwaukee. Many of the individuals involved with the Bonecrushers, including Burns, moved onto be part of the new

Chicago Cardinals The professional American football team now known as the Arizona Cardinals previously played in Chicago, Illinois, as the Chicago Cardinals from 1898 to 1959 before relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, for the 1960 through 1987 seasons. Roots ca ...

franchise based in Villa Park, Ill. While the Bonecrushers franchise is generally regarded as having failed in the eyes of Milwaukeeans, their existence did help create two other CIFL franchises: The Cardinals and the

Wisconsin Wolfpack The Wisconsin Wolfpack was an American football franchise based in Wisconsin. The Wolfpack name and brand was used for two teams: an indoor football team in the Continental Indoor Football League and a traditional (outdoor) football team in the ...

. Plans had already been in place for the Wolfpack to field its first outdoor team in the summer of 2008 when Brown left the Bonecrushers. Eventually, many members of the Wolfpack's staff were brought in to help the Bonecrushers complete the indoor season, including current Green Bay Blizzard Offensive Coordinator Dave Mogensen. In 2009, the Wolfpack fielded a CIFL team of its own in

Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the county seat of Dane County and the capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. As of the 2020 census the population was 269,840, making it the second-largest city in Wisconsin by population, after Milwaukee, and the 80th-lar ...

. The Bonecrushers would play the Wolfpack twice in their final season in Milwaukee, losing both times.

2010: The move to Chicago

The Cardinals replaced the Slaughter in the CIFL, after the Slaughter left that league for the IFL due to a dispute with CIFL management. The Cardinals were formerly known as the

Milwaukee Bonecrushers The Chicago Knights were a professional indoor football team based in Loves Park, Illinois. The Knights were founded in 2010 as a member of the Continental Indoor Football League (CIFL), playing their home games at the Victory Sports Complex. ...

, also of the CIFL, and relocated to Villa Park in 2010. The Cardinals use their name with permission from the original National Football League team, now known as the Arizona Cardinals. The Cardinals only season was one of utter disappointment. After starting 0-2, they signed Kicker

Julie Harshbarger Julie Harshbarger (born December 9, 1985) is an American football placekicker who is currently a free agent. She is most known for being the first woman to score a field goal in Indoor football, as a member of the Chicago Cardinals of the Conti ...

, the 2nd female Kicker in the CIFL history. (The other being

Katie Hnida Katharine Anne Hnida (; born May 17, 1981) is a former American football player who became the first woman to score in an National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA Division I-A game, college football's highest level. She accomplished this as ...

of the Fort Wayne Firehawks) After a successful

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

career at

Benedictine University Benedictine University is a private Roman Catholic university in Lisle, Illinois. It was founded in 1887 as St. Procopius College by the Benedictine monks of St. Procopius Abbey in the Pilsen community on the West Side of Chicago. The institu ...

and

Rockford College Rockford or Rockfords may refer to: Places United States * Rockford, Illinois, a city, the largest municipality of this name *Rockford, Alabama, a town * Rockford, Idaho, a census-designated place * Rockford metropolitan area, Illinois, a United St ...

, where she was named to several all-conference teams. Well Harshbarger was not the first woman to score a point in an indoor football game, but she was the first woman ever to score a field goal in an indoor football game. After a 20-58 loss on May 22, and seeing their record drop to 0-8, the Cardinals let several of their best players, including the All-Purpose Player of the Year (Brandon Wogoman), leave the team for the nearby, and contending,

2011: Becoming the Knights

The Knights started the season with a painful 7-53 loss to the defending champions, the

Cincinnati Commandos The Cincinnati Commandos were a professional indoor football team based in Cincinnati, Ohio. The team suspended operations for the 2013 season, with hope of returning in 2014. They began play in 2010 as an expansion team in the Continental Indo ...

. After almost a complete month off, the Knights were back in action on April 2 against the

Port Huron Predators The Port Huron Predators were a professional Indoor Football team based in Port Huron, Michigan. The team was a member of the Continental Indoor Football League (CIFL). The Predators joined the CIFL in 2011 as an expansion team. The Predators w ...

, and came away with a 45-29 win. The Knights were led by Brandon Wogoman, the reigning CIFL All-Purpose Player of the Year, who had a rushing touchdown, a passing touchdown and a kick-return touchdown to lead the Knights to their first win since the franchise moved to their present location in 2010. After a conflict with the

Odeum Expo Center The Odeum Expo Center was a convention center located in Villa Park, Illinois. It featured of exhibit space at the North Hall and of exhibit space at the South Hall. Both halls had pitched roofs as high as . The South Hall was also used as ...

, the Knights played what was supposed to be a home game in Indianapolis against the

Indianapolis Enforcers The Indianapolis Enforcers were a professional indoor football team based in Indianapolis, Indiana. The team was a member of the Continental Indoor Football League. The Enforcers joined the CIFL in 2011 as an expansion team. The Enforcers were t ...

. Then on April 7, 2011 it was announced that the Knights would play the rest of their games in Loves Park, Illinois in the Victory Sports Complex.

Notable players

Final roster

Awards and honors

The following is a list of all Bonecrushers/Cardinals/Knights players who won individual awards and honors.

Head coaches

Season-by-season results

References

External links

Chicago Knights official website
{{CIFL 2010 establishments in Illinois 2011 disestablishments in Illinois American football teams established in 2010 American football teams disestablished in 2011 Villa Park, Illinois American football teams in Illinois