After an entire day touring the Tucson Convention Center and downtown area, which was capped by eating a ribeye steak at Charro Steak and Del Rey, Indoor Football League commissioner Todd Tryon was officially sold on the Old Pueblo as host of the IFL championship.
The event will be held at the TCC for the next three years, with the first one scheduled for Aug. 23, 2025.
“It wasn’t a tough decision,” Tryon said at a news conference on Thursday. “At the end of the night, I was pretty convinced we made the right decision for the next three years to bring our big event and national championship to Tucson.”
Last Friday, the Rio Nuevo board of directors unanimously approved Tucson Arena as the site for the IFL championship for the 2025, ‘26 and ‘27 seasons. It will be broadcasted on CBS Sports Network.
IFL commissioner Todd Tryon speaks during a news conference on Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024.
“It was a no-brainer for us to get behind this,” Rio Nuevo chairman Fletcher McCusker said. Rio Nuevo recently concluded a 10-year, $100 million renovation project at the convention center.
“When you think of a championship game, you think of a party,” Tryon said. “We have our ownership groups, our players and fans, and for them to go to one location, you need a great entertainment spot.”
The IFL “entertained multiple markets,” according to Tryon, and considered extending its championship location in Las Vegas, but the most recent IFL title game fell on the same day as a Las Vegas Aces (WNBA) game and an NFL preseason game between the Las Vegas Raiders and Dallas Cowboys, which averted attention from the IFL finale.
Other site locations under consideration were Nashville and Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale. Tryon said “there’s multiple reasons” why the IFL selected Tucson to host the the league championship game, “but it was really downtown. ... It seemed like a happening place.” The IFL will host its owner meetings, awards banquet and Hall of Fame ceremonies in the days leading up to the championship game here.
“Tucson is a cool market,” said the IFL commissioner. “I think people will realize that once they get here.”
The IFL is entering its 17th season and has 14 teams across the nation. The league expanded into Tucson in 2019 with the Sugar Skulls, a franchise co-owned by Cathy and Kevin Guy, who is also the president and head coach of the Arizona Rattlers, which just won the IFL championship in the summer.
“It’s been a long road, but it’s been fun,” Cathy Guy said, reflecting on the six-plus seasons of the Sugar Skulls in Tucson.
Tucson Sugar Skulls co-owner Cathy Guy speaks at a news conference on Thursday, Nov. 7, 2024. The IFL championship will be held at Tucson Arena for the next three years.
The inspiration behind an IFL franchise coming to Tucson is the Arizona Bowl, a Mountain West-versus-MAC bowl game founded by Sugar Skulls minority owner Ali Farhang. Entering its 10th season, the Arizona Bowl’s presenting sponsor is renowned hip-hop artist and spokesperson Snoop Dogg and his alcoholic beverage, “Gin & Juice by Dre and Snoop.”
“Kevin and Cathy Guy saw that we can support a college bowl game here in Tucson. If we can support a college bowl game, there’s a good opportunity to support an Indoor Football League team,” Farhang said. “It shouldn’t be understated that in the last calendar year, Tucson has brought Snoop Dogg and a national championship to town.”
When the Guy family looked into the Tucson market for an IFL franchise, “we heard the rumors that a lot of minor-league (baseball) teams have come to town and didn’t stay,” said Kevin Guy.
“We saw that they were supporting the Arizona Bowl, the Roadrunners. This is a different Tucson than it was 20 years ago,” he added. “You’ve seen all the investments that Rio Nuevo has made, and it’s paying off. ... This is more like a (college football) bowl game, because it’s a championship. We’re going to build it out the same way.”
Kevin Guy and Farhang started the initiative to get the IFL championship to Tucson when “we were brain-storming about the Sugar Skulls and things we can do going in to the offseason and the season.”
“I brought up that we had an opportunity to go after the championship game,” Kevin Guy said. “Ali jumps up, he’s so excited and said, ‘Let’s go for it!’ ... We got it done.”
Added Guy: “The opportunity to bring all the fans from across the country from the Indoor Football League to Tucson and experience downtown Tucson, with all of the restaurants and hotels that we have, it’s going to be a great experience and a great experience for our fans in Tucson.”
Between hotel rooms and hospitality, dining, shopping, advertisement, tickets and game-day expenses, the estimated economic impact from the IFL championship week will be close to $1.6 million, according to Rio Nuevo. Edmund Marquez, vice chairman of Rio Nuevo, said about 450 hotel rooms will be booked for the multi-day event in downtown Tucson, with “hundreds of thousands of dollars spent in the retail area.”
Visitors will pay a sales tax and bed tax, “and that money stays here to help pay for our roads and our schools and our libraries,” said Felipe Garcia, CEO and president of Visit Tucson.
“The tourism economic impact is going to be huge from the game itself,” said Garcia.
Visit Tucson will also have commercials aired during the broadcast to showcase Tucson as a destination for travel.
“With this happening in downtown, you’re going to see a lot of people that want to come visit Tucson, see how beautiful Tucson is,” said Marquez. “It’s our chance to show off Tucson.
“They’re going to spend their money here and invest in our community, and we need those dollars here. That’s a big part of our economy.”
