July 22, 2023 

By Shaggy Shragis

For the final game of the season, the Philadelphia Phoenix (5-6) host the Toronto Rush (5-5) Saturday at seven. Toronto will play the DC Breeze Friday night, and can make the playoffs if they win both their game against DC and Philadelphia and Boston loses to Montreal. Philadelphia cannot make the playoffs, but will try and win their sixth game in a row against the Rush. These two teams met week 7 in Canada, a back and forth affair the Hotbirds pulled out by a score of 27-23.

That June 10th matchup was a fascinating moment for both teams. 27 was by far the most points Philadelphia scored this season—the Hotbirds 18.5 points per game is seventh worst in the league—and 23 points was the most any team has scored against Philadelphia all season. Philly has the seventh best scoring defense, allowing just 17.9 points per game, and only one other opponent all season scored more than 20 points.

A big reason for that offensive explosion was the success of both teams' deep games. Ty Barbieri’s 503 receiving yards was the most by any player against Philadelphia all season, and nearly 200 more yards than any other player has managed to rack up. Teams in Toronto—including the Rush—complete hucks at a 15% higher rate than they do outside of The 6. Both these teams have also struggled defending deep shots this season, with Philly allowing the tenth most completed hucks and Toronto the 12th. Despite how much more teams are letting it fly in Toronto, both these squads will likely lean on the long ball in the match, viewing it as a weakness for the other team.

This is a dicier proposition than their coaching staffs would let on. Both teams have been dismal at earning the disc back on offense, ranking near the bottom of the league in hold rate. Despite the allure of the high variance huck, neither team is converting at nearly a high enough rate to make it a winning play. This could spell particularly bad news for Toronto. Despite Philadelphia’s dismal deep defense these last few games, their D-line is still tops in the league at scoring on a turn. The Rush are one of the worst teams in the league at scoring on defensive opportunities, which is why they lost the previous matchup: the Hotbirds were 7/11 on break chances, Toronto was 5/10.

Despite the losing streak in recent games, Philadelphia has won their last five against Toronto. Only a single Toronto player, Mike Mackenzie, has ever beaten the Phoenix as a member of the Rush. Toronto will also be without their star from the last game, Ty Barbieri, and are still without Phil Turner, their captain and 2022 all star representative who was sidelined with an injury earlier this year. Barbieri leads the team in +/-, and it will be difficult for an already middling offense to replace his production.

But Philadelphia’s two game skid—knocking them out of the playoffs—has left them a less extreme favorite in this game than had they played two weeks ago. Philadelphia left their three game Canada trip as the league's best defense, and has fallen back quite a ways after giving up 20 or more points in back to back games. Furthermore, their offense, which turned the season around following their week three loss in Boston, has in the past two weeks failed to put together quarters that rivaled DC or Boston. In both games, the offense did well, but they could not maintain their consistency through all four quarters, letting Boston jump out to an early lead, and letting DC crawl back into the game and eventually win in overtime.

Toronto will be a good test for a Philadelphia team that has either lost every game to an opponent, or won every game, but split nothing. It will also be the first building block for a very curious off season. Roger and Tom know that they need to adjust the offense, either from a schematic or personnel perspective, and with the fickle nature of AUDL off-season, there is no better time to do it than this final game. Without the playoffs to play for, the Hotbirds need to show that all the hard work they put in this year has been towards paving a path towards a future of title contention. They can beat Toronto, but they really should obliterate them. 40-19, Philadelphia breaks the all time points in a game record en route to an all-time smashing of their feathered opponents (the Toronto mascot is a cardinal). Go Birds.