All-girls tackle football team takes to field in possible first in Toronto high school history

A group of Ontario high school girls may have made history when they took to the field in Toronto on Thursday to play a series of exhibition tackle football games.

The new all-girls tackle football team at Western Technical-Commercial School is believed to be the first at the Toronto District School Board.

The team started practicing for the first time less than two months ago. On Thursday, they got their first taste of game action at York University, where they were hosted by the provincial sport organization Football Ontario.

Quarterback and Grade 11 student Avrie Medeiros said she'd thrown many touchdowns in practice but on Thursday, finally learned what it felt like to throw one in a game with two separate touchdown passes.

"It was such an amazing feeling, and just having everyone cheering in the background and supporting you, it was honestly a very nice feeling," she said.

Cairo Gregory, a Grade 10 student, said she felt butterflies before the game started.

"I almost puked earlier, but I'm good now," said Gregory, who plays centre.

"I just got nervous, I feel like everyone else here has played for a while, or at least a little bit before us. We're all new to it. It's a new team. We don't necessarily have a captain. But as soon as we started playing, we were good."

Gregory said the team is doing something new and called what they're doing "promising."

Aaron Geisler, executive director of Football Ontario, said there is no high school tackle football league for girls but the plan is to have one in place soon.

"Today is all about just getting more exposure and game time for the girls and the athletes to be able to compete and see teams from across the province," he said. "There's a demand, as we can see here today."

The organization hosted four all-girls tackle football teams on Thursday. Also in attendance were teams from St. Joseph High School and St. Mark High School in Ottawa and from St. Benedict Catholic Secondary School in Sudbury.

Teagan Roy, a member of the girls' tackle football team from St. Mark High School in Ottawa, said she started playing two years ago on the boys' Grade 9 team.

Now that there's a girls' team, she said she is helping to pave the way for others who want to play.

"I'm so excited for them, I try to hype them up as much as possible," she said. "It's so fun actually seeing new people come out."

Football Ontario plans to launch the first event of the Ontario Women's Football League, the first women's tackle football league in the province, on Saturday.

The organization says it aims "to develop a league where girls and young women, often marginalized in the sport of football, can find like-minded teammates and participate in the sport without being limited to the periphery due to barriers, both real and perceived."