WHO ARE THE FLORIDA REDBACKS?
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 The Florida Redbacks were born when New York native Marc Karver moved to Tampa and met up with Australians Jason Eustice, Ben Hancock and Steve Darlington at an AFL Grand Finals Party in Sarasota. Marc was exposed to Australian football while at Vanderbilt University and fell in love with the sport. For a number of years he played with various teams in the USAFL (United States Australian Football League) before moving to Tampa from Denver where his team (the Denver Bulldogs) had won 2 of the last 3 national titles. Upon his arrival, he looked to start a team in Florida which brought him to the Grand Finals party in Sarasota.
At 5am on that fateful day, Marc, Jason, Ben and Steve decided to start the Florida Redbacks. With training starting off as 4 guys having a kick every weekend, the team started to grow as they slowly gathered other Australians who were missing the sport they grew up with, and
Americans who were being taught how to play.
Marc met Trevor Stokes while working at the University of South Florida a few weeks later. Trevor, originally from Fremantle, Western Australia, had been living in the United States for many years and was only able to get his Aussie Rules fix by following his beloved Fremantle Dockers from half way around the world. Marc asked Trevor to come play but Trevor (wisely) declined and offered to coach instead.
The club grew fast in it's first year (2003), having enough players to host a game in Sarasota against the Atlanta Kookaburras. Due to the novelty of the sport and successful advertising, this first game grew a large crowd. Unfortunately, the Redbacks lost this first game, despite a hard fight. The next year (January 24 2004) Atlanta returned to Tampa, and this time the Redbacks shocked the USAFL Division 1 Kookaburras, winning 79 to 65.
On April 16 2005, the Redbacks played in their inaugural EAFL (Eastern Australian Football League) game against the Baltimore-Washington Eagles, winning 14.16.100 to 1.3.9. The Redbacks enjoyed a successfull season, most notably marked by a major upset of the 5th Ranked Boston Deamons, winning 9.8.62 to 6.9.45 in Sarasota.
April 2005 also marked growth for the Redbacks and Australian Football in Florida alike by the formation of the Ft. Lauderdale Fighting Squids where a group of Aussies got together in South Florida to form a social and sporting club to promote Aussie Football and culture. This club is an independent sister club of the Redbacks that has it's own board and schedule, but joins the Redbacks as a united Florida team for USAFL Nationals.
The 2006 season saw the Redbacks drop out of the EAFL due to issues traveling to games in New York, Boston, North Carolina, Philadelphia & Baltimore on a regular basis.
During this period, development of the University of South Florida Australian Rules Football Club continued in a very positive way. This happened despite the fact that USF Student President Danny Harrison spent a semester in Australia (Macquarie University) after winning a US Footy scholarship.
The year closed out with the Redbacks traveling to Las Vegas for Nationals and starting the popular USF/Tampa metro games which feature players split into Green and Gold teams that play against each other every week.
2007 started off on a positive note with the Tampa/USF squad winning an Australia Day tournament against the Sarasota squad and the visting Vanderbuilt University club. Home and away games against Atlanta this spring are already scheduled, as well as other potential games in the works. Discussion has already begun about forming a Southeast league for 2008.
USF Student Club President, Danny Harrison, in the Macquarie Globe online newspaper. Danny was the recipient of a 2006 US Footy scholarship to attend school for one semester and play Australian football at Macquarie University near Sydney. Danny was told about the scholarship by Redback Dustin Jones, and 2004 scholarship winner (and former Redbacks) Justin Valley. After filling out the paperwork, and being scouted at Nationals, he was awarded the scholarship in November, and off to Sydney he went!
| 2007 FLORIDA REDBACKS BOARD |
President: Mike Gamache
Vice-President: Alex Mirakian
Vice-President: Mustapha Turay
Secretary: Marc Karver
Treasurer: Joey Maggio
Coach: Trevor Stokes
Assistant Coach: Steve Darlington
Assistant Coach: Alex Mirakian
Captain: CJ Morton
Vice-Captain: Ben Hancock
USF Club President: Danny Harrison
USF Faculty Advisor: Marc Karver
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Who are the Redbacks?
