ST. LOUIS — Surprise! Well, not really. St. Louis still loves football.
The support for the XFL's BattleHawks has only grown over the last few weeks, with fans getting increasingly anxious for the home opener on Feb. 23 at the Dome downtown.
The last home pro football game in St. Louis was played on Dec. 17, 2015. Now, 1,529 long days later, it will return.
Pro football is back in St. Louis, and the BattleHawks are planning for a packed house on Sunday at the Dome.
As of Monday, the BattleHawks said they are expecting 28,000 fans for their home opener. Some premium seats still remain through the team, but you're going to have to go through the secondary market to find most of the tickets out there.
At the time of this writing, the cheapest re-sale ticket on Ticketmaster is $90. You could've bought season tickets for the entire home slate of games at the beginning of the year starting at $100.
St. Louis really has gone BattleHawks crazy. The TV ratings have been impressive, the fan interaction on social media has been the most frenzied in the league and the BattleHawks have sold more merchandise than any other XFL franchise so far.
The atmosphere at the Dome on Sunday promises to be off the charts.
"We want a loud, energetic crowd on full display as soon as the national audience tunes in to ESPN at 2pm on the dot. We want 27,000-plus football-loving fans waving their rally towels to show everyone what a great football town St. Louis is," BattleHawks President Kurt Hunzeker said in a statement.
The BattleHawks have confirmed the upper bowl of the Dome will remain closed, but they are encouraging fans to look at tickets for the other four home games on the schedule if they weren't able to snag tickets to the home opener.
The BattleHawks earned a split in Texas after the first two weeks of the XFL season, beating Dallas in week one and falling in a thriller to Houston in week two.
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