In the fermionic Hubbard model, doubly occupied states have an exponentially large lifetime for strong repulsive interactions U. We show that this property can be used to prepare a metastable s-wave superfluid state for fermionic atoms in optical lattices described by a large-U Hubbard model. When an initial band-insulating state is expanded, the doubly occupied sites Bose condense. A mapping to the ferromagnetic Heisenberg model in an external field allows for a reliable solution of the problem. Nearest-neighbor repulsion and pair hopping are important in stabilizing superfluidity.