In a league of their own, women tackle football

By

Posted 7:22PM on Saturday, July 30, 2005

ATLANTA (AP) Sue Cackowski makes a living cracking bones. On weekdays, she runs a chiropractic clinic. On weekends, she gets tackled by 200-pound defensive linemen, er, linewomen. The 35-year-old chiropractor spends many Saturdays reading defenses and launching passes as the quarterback for the undefeated Atlanta Xplosion, which is preparing to play in the Independent Women's Football League's Championship Game next Saturday in Manchester, N.H. ``I was a big bully. I used to beat up boys,'' said Cackowski, who lives near the Alabama border in Bowdon, Ga, not far from her practice. Xplosion is one of 24 teams in the five-year-old IWFL, one of three major women's professional football leagues in the country. The only teams with mascots that hint at the gender of the players on their rosters are the Oakland Banshees and the Sacramento Sirens the other team in this year's IWFL title game. The Sirens haven't lost a playoff game since 2002. Some team names are just as masculine as any found in the NFL, such as the Tampa Bay Terminators, New York Sharks or Kansas City Storm to name a few. IWFL games are played on Saturdays starting in early April. After the 11-game regular season ends in late June, two rounds of playoffs are used to determine the teams that play in the championship game. Cackoski says the only real difference from the NFL is that the ball is smaller. Most of the players are accustomed to the perplexed looks and subsequent questions they draw when they tell strangers they play professional football: Full-tackle really means full-tackle? Yes. There's no holding back. With broken bones and concussions? Sometimes. What about your breasts? How do you protect them? You do protect them, right? ``Double up,'' said Assistant Xplosion Coach Charlene Vance, shaking her head as she explained that some women wear two sports bras at the same time. ``Some of the more well-endowed girls, I don't know how they do it. Some of them tape pads around their chest,'' she said laughing. Vance played for the Xplosion for two seasons as a defensive back and wide receiver. She started coaching when she wanted to have a baby because she ``didn't think it would be a good idea to be running around the field with a big pregnant belly.'' Now she stands on the sidelines and coaches her twin sister, running back and leading league rusher Charmaine Chin. Both sisters attended Georgia Tech on track and field scholarships. And women's football isn't limited to one league. The National Women's Football Association (NWFA), which started in 2000 with just two teams now has 36, including the now-defunct Atlanta Leopards. The Women's Professional Football League (WPFL) was started with two teams in 1999. By the next year, the league grew to 10 teams, and currently the WPFL boasts 18 teams. The Leopards didn't play last season because ``the owner wasn't able to get her finances together,'' said Catherine Masters, the NWFA's founder and CEO. ``It's very hard to run a team properly if you don't have the time to do it. It's impossible to run a team, play on a team, and have a full-time job.'' Currently, the NWFA's Atlanta team is for sale. The licensing fee for an NWFA team starts at $35,000. Women who play pro football are a diverse crowd, according to Boo Hunter, a retired offensive linewoman who played for the IWFL's California Quake for three years. ``The thing that's amazing about the teams, is you do have your have tomboys, your women who look like they oughta be playing football, and your girly-girls you would never imagine would play football,'' said Hunter, a computer programmer. ``There are stay-at-home moms and truck driver. The athletic skill is the common denominator. It's the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. I think the challenge is what drives a lot of people.'' Hunter stopped playing football because her 40-something-year-old knees couldn't take it anymore. Instead, she now maintains a Web site that tracks the three women's leagues, the IWFL, WPFL, and the NWFA, and lists up-to-date statistics. Though the leagues all started around five years ago, they weren't the first. Two years ago, Hunter's Web site was like alphabet soup, because there were about eight different leagues. Most dissolved, or teams joined more successful leagues. The idea of a women's league is more than 30 years old. In the 1970s, there was an effort to start a women's football league. The Los Angeles Dandylions were even featured in an episode of ``Charlie Angels,'' the popular TV show of the time. Hunter attributed the rise in popularity of women's football to Title IV, the legislation Congress passed in 1972 that prohibits discrimination against females in federally-funded education, particularly in athletics. ``There's a lot more acceptance for women's team sports than there was 30 years ago because it's part of our culture now,'' Hunter said, citing women's professional basketball, soccer, and softball. The reason women's pro football hasn't caught on with the same fervor as the WNBA, Hunter says, is because girls are still discouraged from playing even flag football, let alone donning helmets and pads. ``It's a man's game. Football isn't a contact sport, it's a collision sport,'' Hunter said. ``There's nothing ladylike or genteel about it.'' None of the players in the leagues are paid. The reason they are deemed professionals is because they play by NFL rules. They often absorb some of the costs of playing, like driving themselves to away games, or buying their own equipment. It takes about $100,000 to run a season, and the costs that sponsors and ticket sales don't cover are paid for by the owner, Gilmore said. The hope is that players will eventually be compensated. ``We feel like it will go the same direction as the WNBA,'' Vance said. ---- On the Net: http://www.iwflsports.com http://www.womensfootballcentral.com http://members.aol.com/booinla/ (Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)