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Date | August 17, 2013 | ||||||||||||||||||
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Arena | Amway Center, Orlando, Florida | ||||||||||||||||||
MVP |
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Attendance | 12,039 | ||||||||||||||||||
Winning coach | Kevin Guy | ||||||||||||||||||
Losing coach | Clint Dolezel | ||||||||||||||||||
TV in the United States | |||||||||||||||||||
Network | CBS | ||||||||||||||||||
Announcers | Andrew Catalon, Anthony Herron, Sherdrick Bonner, Ari Wolfe | ||||||||||||||||||
ArenaBowl XXVI was the 26th edition of the championship in the Arena Football League. The National Conference champion Arizona Rattlers, defeated the American Conference champion Philadelphia Soul, 48–39. The game was played on August 17, 2013 at Amway Center in Orlando, Florida, home of the Orlando Predators.
The halftime show was performed by KISS.
The two teams met one year earlier in ArenaBowl XXV, in which the Rattlers took home the league championship by a score of 72–54. This was the first time that two teams met in consecutive ArenaBowls.
ArenaBowl XXVI was played at Amway Center in Orlando, Florida, after a unanimous vote by all 14 teams in the league. It was the second consecutive ArenaBowl to be played at a neutral site, and the seventh in the history of the league. For the city of Orlando, it was the first ArenaBowl played there since ArenaBowl XIV in 2000 when the Orlando Predators defeated the Nashville Katz at the since-demolished Amway Arena.
ArenaBowl XXVI was televised by CBS, as part of a two-year agreement between the league and the network to air weekly regular season games, as well as two postseason games, on CBS Sports Network.
The Soul reached the ArenaBowl for the second consecutive season, having lost to the Rattlers in ArenaBowl XXV. They began the 2013 season with a 4–4 record, but proceeded to win eight of their ten remaining regular season games to clinch their division again with a 12–6 record. In the conference semifinals, they defeated the Orlando Predators in a back-and-forth affair by a 59–55 score. In the conference championship, they faced the Jacksonville Sharks as they had in the previous season. Philadelphia won the game on the road 75–59 to earn their third ArenaBowl berth in franchise history.