By Jessica Book
Hitting is the best part, according to Marie Bosco.
“I love to hit,” she says. “It’s so fun to just let all your energy out and put all your effort into it.”
Bosco plays tackle football with the 15-and 16-year-old Bell Warriors bantam team.
That’s despite the fact that at 5-5 and 135 lbs, Bosco weighs about 50 lbs less than her average opponent.
Her coach, Jim Wagdin, says Bosco is one of his best players.
“She’s a good player, a good athlete,” he says. “It’s difficult for girls to compete at (the bantam) level because it’s a very physical activity. But she proved a lot of people wrong, even me.”
Wagdin says he was worried Bosco might be more of a distraction than an asset, but she earned a spot in the starting line-up as a corner linebacker responsible for pass coverage.
Bosco led her team in interceptions this year and was a key player in the Warriors’ 18-7 victory against the Belair-Copeland Lions for the league championship Nov. 3.
Bosco has played football for seven years, but after next season the 16-year-old’s tackle football career will be over.
With one year of eligibility left at the bantam level she will play overage and underweight in bantam next year. She will not move up to the midget league because the guys are simply too big and her chances of being injured are too great. Even boys at the bantam level weight up to 200 lbs.
The idea of quitting football, however, doesn’t seem to bother her. Bosco has also played women’s rugby for the past two summers and she intends to continue with it after she finishes with football.
“I really like both (football and rugby),” Bosco says, adding she can’t pick a favourite. “They’re two different games — I like different things about each.”
Specifically, she says she likes the contact and hanging out with the guys in football.
“It’s awesome,” says Bosco. “It’s like having a bunch of big brothers — they all treat me like their little sister. And none of them have a problem with me playing.”
As for rugby, Bosco says she likes the faster pace.
“(The game) doesn’t stop as much in rugby,” she says. “It’s more consistent and the players are more my size.”
Wayne Chorney, president of the National Capital Amateur Football Association, says there is nothing stopping girls from playing midget-level football. He does, however, have serious reservations about typically smaller-framed girls going head-to-head against guys twice their size.
“(Girls) can play if they’re competent enough to do so,” Chorney says. “But I wouldn’t recommend it. (At the midget level) you’re talking about guys with no weight restrictions — I would be a little bit concerned.”
There is no girls’ tackle football league in the Ottawa area so girls have no choice but to play with guys if they want to play.
In fact Bosco is one of only 33 females, out of a total 53,644 tackle football players of all ages, registered with Football Canada.
Those numbers include community teams across Canada and exclude high school teams which may have girls on their roster.
For now, the boys and girls will have to play together, and Bosco does not see anything wrong with that as long as both are comparable in size and calibre.
“If (girls) are good enough to play, then why not let them play?” she says.