Women in College and Professional Football
Of the women who have seen action in men's college and pro football, almost all have been in special teams positions that are protected from physical contact. The first professional player was a placekick holder (a traditionally trivial position usually occupied by a person who holds another position on the team), while the best known female college football players were all placekickers, with all having primarily played women's soccer prior to converting.
Patricia Palinkas is on record as being the first female professional football player, having played for the Orlando Panthers of the Atlantic Coast Football League in 1970. Palinkas was a placekick holder for her placekicker husband.
On October 18, 1997, Liz Heaston became the first woman to play and score in a college football game, kicking two extra points. Prior to this game, female athletes at Duke and Louisville had come close to playing in a game but did not. In 2001, Ashley Martin became the second female athlete to score in a college football game, this time in the NCAA. In 2003, Katie Hnida became the first female athlete to score in a Division I-A bowl game; she later became the second professional player when she signed with the Fort Wayne FireHawks.
Read more about this topic: Women's American Football
Famous quotes containing the words women, college, professional and/or football:
“Always carry it in thy mind, and act upon it, as a sure maxim: “That women are timid:” And ‘tis well they are—else there would be no dealing with them.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“It is true enough, Cambridge college is really beginning to wake up and redeem its character and overtake the age.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“... a supportive husband is an absolute requirement for professional women.... He is something she looks for, and when she finds him, she marries him.”
—Alice S. Rossi (b. 1922)
“People stress the violence. That’s the smallest part of it. Football is brutal only from a distance. In the middle of it there’s a calm, a tranquility. The players accept pain. There’s a sense of order even at the end of a running play with bodies stewn everywhere. When the systems interlock, there’s a satisfaction to the game that can’t be duplicated. There’s a harmony.”
—Don Delillo (b. 1926)