ST. LOUIS—On a day when roughly 100,000 fans were expected to descend on downtown St. Louis for professional football, soccer and baseball, 40,317 of them showed out at The Dome at America’s Center to see the St. Louis Battlehawks win the team’s home opener 27-24 over Arlington Saturday night.

The attendance figure set a new modern spring football league record, breaking the team’s previous mark set during the 2023 XFL season. The total nearly matched the United Football League's entire attendance across four venues last week, and topped the announced attendance of 37,328 at Busch Stadium to watch the Cardinals beat the Marlins.

Andre Szmyt hit a 22-yard field goal as time expired one week after St. Louis lost on a 64-yard try made by Michigan’s Jake Bates, Szymyt’s offseason training partner.

“When you don’t win your first game and you lose like you did last week…long kick…you’re just like man, it could take the wind out of you a little bit right, but I just felt like the guys were good,” Head Coach Anthony Becht said. 

Quarterback A.J. McCarron went 12-29 for 248 yards and two touchdowns, both to wide receiver Marcel Ateman, including a 53-yard strike late in the third quarter. The duo has rediscovered the chemistry they first developed while with the Oakland Raiders years ago.

A week after not making the dress roster, running back Mataeo Durant ran for 105 yards and a touchdown.

“I love St. louis. I love this fanbase. To come out here with a soccer game, a Cardinal game today, this is awesome and I was just glad we were able to get the W for them. I think that’s the most important thing,” Becht said. ”I know they’re going to come out there, support our team win lose or draw but to get a w in front of the crowd and the opener really important.”

Becht said previously that his defensive players were going to have challenges with crowd noise, as fewer players are allowed to wear headsets to hear play calls in their helmet.

Linebacker Pita Taumoepenu confirmed it was true Saturday night.

“It was so loud, I’m not gonna lie. The first half you couldn’t even hear the plays..we were out here…what’s the plays? It was so loud,” he said.

In his first season with St. Louis after playing with Seattle last season, Taumoepenu had two sacks to lead the Battlehawks defense, and nearly had a third. A terror on the field, Taumoepenu is soft-spoken off it. But he had high praise for his new fanbase that made an impression on him as soon as he got off the team bus for the club’s “Battlewalk” into the Dome.

“Shout out to the fans out there, you made it possible for us to win today. The way the fans come out and interact with us is great, starting when we first got here. I mean we do a whole walk… How could you not go out there and play hard for the fans, you know so it was awesome,”  Taumoepenu said.

UFL co-owner Dany Garcia was on hand for the home opener in a market that sets the standard for her league. She talked before the game about the importance of having a building with “juice” in it, where players are competing in a packed house where the stakes matter.

The UFL’s championship will be played here in June, ideally, she confirmed, with the Battlehawks playing in it.

“The fact is, St. Louis is a sports town. And that we could come have our championship game here, really I want this city to feel an homage and respect,” she said. 

Those words likely strike a chord with a St. Louis fanbase that still feels disrespected by the way it was treated by the NFL and Rams owner Stan Kroenke, who castigated St. Louis as a football market and said he had to move the team to Los Angeles because St. Louis couldn’t support three professional sports teams. 

The Battlehawks crowd chanted Kroenke’s name in vain several times Saturday night, more than eight years after the Rams left town. 

Among the throngs of fans tailgaiting hours before kickoff, Joe Kosulandich, of Herculaneum admitted that the Rams' depature is still a sore spot, but suggested the Battlehawks offer a form of sporting civic redemption.

“It’s awesome for the city, it’s just awesome for St. Louis and we are a football town. Everybody’s a little bitter still about the Stan Kroenke thing but we’re showing the NFL that we are a football town,” he said.

The Battlehawks (1-1), travel to San Antonio next Sunday and return to St. Louis April 20 when they host Memphis.