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All Hail Haley Making College Football History
All Hail Haley Making College Football History
By Leonard Shapiro
Not long after Haley Van Voorhis made college football history on Sept. 23, Colorado football coach and NFL Hall of Fame defensive back Deion Sanders was asked about her on-field debut as a safety on the Shenandoah University football team.
“Awesome,” Sanders said during a news conference. “I’m all for it.”
So was Billie Jean King, who made tennis history herself in 1973 when she beat a male player, Bobby Riggs in a widely ballyhooed “Battle of the Sexes” match. Fifty years later, she sent out a tweet congratulating Van Voorhis.
With less than a minute left in the first quarter and Shenandoah already leading Juniata College by 26 points, on a wet and windy Saturday afternoon in Winchester, Van Voorhis was sent into the game.
When the 5-foot-6, 145-pound junior from The Plains stepped on the field on third and long, she became the first woman who was not a kicker or a punter to play a regular position in an NCAA football game.
Van Voorhis had waited patiently for more than two years for the opportunity, and when it came, she didn’t disappoint. She initially lined up a few yards from the line of scrimmage, then pushed up to the line and blitzed. She got through untouched, hurried an incomplete throw by Juniata quarterback Calvin German, then tackled him an instant after he’d released the ball.
“It’s an amazing thing,” Van Voorhis said after the game. “I just wanted to get out and do my thing. I want to show other people this is what women can do, to show what I can do. It’s a big moment. I made the impossible possible, and I’m excited about that.”
She was not alone. ESPN was on hand to record the moment for posterity and Sports Center. The Washington Post covered the game, and over the next week, a number of major media outlets—including ESPN.com, Sports Illustrated and USA Today—also ran stories on Van Voorhis’s first game.
Up in the stands at Shentel Stadium, University President Tracy Fitzsimmons sat among several hundred water-logged spectators, including the players’ proud parents, Chandler and Heidi. President Fitzsimmons was both soaked and smiling broadly at halftime, clearly thrilled to see Van Voorhis enter the game minutes earlier.
“It’s an extraordinary accomplishment for women everywhere,” said Shenandoah’s first woman president since the school was founded in 1875. “I am so happy for Haley because she’s earned this.”
Van Voorhis has been playing against the boys since she joined a co-ed flag football team in the fifth grade. She also was the first girl to play high school football at Christchurch, a boarding school located about an hour east of Richmond, where she saw considerable action at wide receiver and defensive back and was named team captain her senior year.
Her high school coach, Edward Homer, once described her as “a badass. She’s not afraid of anything.”
Shenandoah head coach Scott Yoder, clearly has been impressed with her and said he has no qualms about playing her.
“Haley’s been a great teammate,” Yoder said. “She’s quiet and goes about her business. The guys respect her because she shows up and does the work on the field and in the weight room. She’s been a very positive member of our team. She’s very good mentally and understands her role. I have confidence in her that she knows her job and can execute it.”
