Biladeau friends with the enemy
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By Craig DeVrieze | Sunday, May 18, 2008 |
Troy Biladeau thinks of Bruce Cowdrey as a second father.
Which is not to say the Quad-City Steamwheelers coach won’t be trying his darnedest to defeat Cowdrey’s Peoria Pirates on Saturday at the i wireless Center.
“If my Mom was coaching Peoria, I’d still want to beat them,’’ said the rookie
Q-C head coach.
Biladeau once quarterbacked at Fort Hays State College in Kansas behind an offensive line coached by Cowdrey. He got his coaching start as a graduate assistant at the same school, under Cowdrey.
A few years later, Cowdrey recommended Biladeau for the head coaching job of the Indoor Football League’s Wichita Warlords.
“I respect him as a person and a coach,’’ Cowdrey said of his protegé. “(The Steamwheelers) couldn’t be in better hands.’’
As the Steamwheelers and Pirates prepare to meet for the first time since Cowdrey and Peoria temporarily left arenafootball2 for a rival startup league in 2005, this clearly is not your father’s Quad-Cities-Peoria rivalry.
Veteran Steamwheelers fans will recall the heated, seemingly hateful contests pitting Cowdrey and former Q-C head coach Rich Ingold.
“Face it,” Cowdrey said, “you had two guys and neither one of them would back up an inch on anything. The truth of the matter is, it got to where it was pretty important for both coaches to win.”
In six meetings between 2002 and 2004, both coaches won as many as they lost, but Cowdrey may have had the last laugh, winning the ArenaCup title in 2002, when Ingold’s Wheelers were banned from the postseason, and reaching the championship game in 2004.
Cowdrey since has collected an AFL championship ring. He coached fullbacks and linebackers for Mike Hohensee’s Chicago Rush when they rallied from a losing season to win the ArenaBowl in 2006.
He had landed there after a highly frustrating season in the start-up United Indoor Football League with Peoria in 2005.
“One year, you can call it loyalty,’’ Cowdrey said of his decision to coach in that low-budget league after his owners opted to bolt from af2. “Two years, you call it insanity. By the end of the first year, I’d done my bit for loyalty. I wanted to keep my name reputation among players and coaches, so I got to the AFL.’’
After spending last season as an assistant with AFL Austin, Cowdrey jumped at the chance to coach his own team again in his adopted hometown when a Texas group opted to relaunch the af2 Pirates in Peoria.
“I’m home and I am happy to be home,’’ he said of a place he remained during offseasons. “I love Peoria.’’
Cowdrey feels at home back in af2, as well,
“It has improved light years,’’ he said. “The coaches are better. The players are tons better. The organizations and front offices are better.
“And then,’’ he said, “you have the officiating. So three out of the four are better.’’
One thing hasn’t changed — Cowdrey remains a notorious ref-hater and baiter. And, although his relationship with the Q-C coach might be warmer, little else has changed about his coaching style.
He still is a relentless recruiter and he still changes players at the drop of a football.
“I think we’ve got six left from training camp,’’ said Cowdrey, whose 2-4 Pirates share the Midwest Division basement with the Wheelers.
And despite his friendship with Biladeau, Cowdrey is confident something else won’t change: He still expects to be Public Enemy No. 1 Saturday at the i wireless Center.
“Quad-Cities-Peoria? It’s a clean darned hate,’’ he said. “I guarantee there are going to be some people who even call me fat over there.’’
Craig DeVrieze can be contacted at (563) 333-2610 or cdevrieze@qctimes.com. Comment on this story at qctimes.com.
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