Italian-based American football team
The Parma Panthers are an American football team based in Parma, Italy that competes in the Italian Football League. The team was founded in 1981 by Vic Dasaro,[1] an American veterinary student attending university in Parma.
Dasaro created the team from an amalgam of power lifters from a local high school gym, ex-rugby players, other vet students, and a mixed bunch of soccer goalies, track and field athletes, and local kids who had seen football on the occasional TV broadcast and liked the helmet and shoulderpad look. The team is now built on longtime IFL veterans and young players from the Panthers' own youth teams, with still a healthy contingent of University of Parma students.
In 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2021 and 2023 the Panthers won the IFL championship by beating respectively Catania Elephants, Bergamo Lions, Catania Elephants, and Milano Seamen.[2] In 2021 they won their fifth title.