Opener vs. Todd Haley’s Bandits highlight Pittsburgh Maulers’ 10-game schedule
A primetime opener against a team coached by former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator Todd Haley highlights the schedule for the Pittsburgh Maulers’ inaugural season in the re-launched USFL.
The Maulers will play Haley’s Tampa Bay Bandits in an 8 p.m. kickoff April 17, the final game of the opening weekend for a league that shares the name of the spring football league that attempted to rival the NFL in the 1980s.
The USFL announced its entire week-by-week schedule Monday morning, but only Week 1’s games had times and exact dates.
Drop everything, the Maulers schedule is HERE ????
Game tickets drop tonight at 7pm ET ⏱ pic.twitter.com/u8PYvsFC2I
— Pittsburgh Maulers (@USFLMaulers) March 7, 2022
Each of the eight teams in the USFL reboot will play a 10-game regular season — three games each against their North or South division rivals and a game apiece against teams from the other division.
Haley, an Upper St. Clair native, called Steelers plays from 2012-17. For the first two years of that tenure, also part of the offensive staff was running backs coach Kirby Wilson. Wilson is the Maulers’ head coach.
Week 1 is going to be fun ????
USFL game tickets drop tonight at 7pm ET ???? pic.twitter.com/OkaemUhj4S
— USFL (@USFL) March 7, 2022
The opener is designated as a “home” game for the Maulers — but that is in name only, as all 2022 USFL games will be played in Birmingham, Ala. The league has said it hopes to move games to its eight city sites in subsequent years.
After the opener, the Maulers will play “at” the North division rivals Philadelphia Stars in Week 2 and Michigan Panthers in Week 3 and at “home” to the New Jersey Generals in Week 4.
The Maulers’ regular season is scheduled to end in mid-June against the Panthers.
The top two in each division will make the playoffs — assuming, of course, the league makes it that far. The past two professional spring leagues folded before their seasons ended: the Alliance of American Football in 2019 and the XFL the next year.
Chris Adamski is a TribLive reporter who has covered primarily the Pittsburgh Steelers since 2014 following two seasons on the Penn State football beat. A Western Pennsylvania native, he joined the Trib in 2012 after spending a decade covering Pittsburgh sports for other outlets. He can be reached at cadamski@triblive.com.
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