The lights illuminated the field we were standing on. The other team was still in their locker room, we were on their home field. The stands were roaring as the Rockets sprinted onto the field and starting warming up. The cheerleaders lined the sides of the field getting the fans pumped for the big game. Coach Hoffman yelled at us to quit standing around and start warming up. Michael, one of my best friends on the team, and I passed the ball back and forth for a while. He could tell I was nervous so he tried to calm me down and help me focus. He doesn’t ever seem nervous, it’s not fair. We knew it was almost time to start so the cheerleaders formed our tunnel and as we ran through the announcers would call us off our names. I always hated this part. They got to my name; I was always last, “Ashley Jones, senior, quarterback and captain for the Panthers!” I heard loud boos and shouting from the crowd, that’s usually how it went. I’m sure they all think, “A girl quarterback? She probably sucks. I bet she can’t throw more than ten yards.” I try not to let it get to me. I need to focus to the game. This is the biggest game of my life. The Minnesota high school championship game.
The referees call in the captain’s for the coin toss. Our captains were Michael and I. As the coin got flung into the air, I called heads, it landed on tails. Their captains chose to kick and said something like they won’t get anywhere with it anyways. The other captain snickered and walked away without shaking Michaels or my hand. I try not to be bothered by this.
I go sit on the bench to wait for the game to start. I watch as our kick returner, Joey, catches the ball 10 yards from their end zone. He ran up 15 yards, and then he was tackled. It was my turn to take the field. This was probably the most nervous I have ever been. We all huddled up and I called the play. The second I stepped onto the field the whole crowd was booing and shouting again. I tried to block them out. Allen our center, hiked the ball back to me, I looked out to Brady who was being heavily defended by one of their players. I looked left; to our wide receiver Alex he was wide open. I lobbed the pass out to him and he ran for the touchdown. We all ran to each other and chest bumped. Coach gave me the biggest smile I think I had ever seen. Their fans stopped booing and shouting. Then, we kicked to their returner and he ran 40 yards before he was tackled by Zach. I watched their quarterback carefully as he walked onto the field with confidence. I wondered if I looked like that. Probably not, because I sure didn’t feel that way. I watched as he spiraled it out to their wide receiver who was just short of the ball and missed it. The next play was a handoff to their running back who dodged all of our defenders and then ran for a touchdown. The rest of the game went similar to this.
It was the fourth and final quarter with a minute to go. We were losing 21-25. We needed a touchdown to win. We were at the 15 yard line and it was 4th down. Coach took a timeout. He told us all we needed to focus. He made sure we all knew what play we were doing. I was supposed to fake to Alex then pass to Michael. I was really nervous because our main linebacker got hurt. So we had to sub in our rookie, Cody. Coach talked to him for a while and made sure he knew what he was doing. The refs blew their whistles and the timeout was over. This is it. If we get this touchdown we win the state title. I won’t just be the girl who thinks she can play football. I’ll be the girl who can play football and kicks ass at it. I need to concentrate. Just a simple pass to Michael. I can do this. Michael looked at me and gave me a reassuring smile. I loved him for that; he could always make me smile. Here we go. Cody hikes me the ball, I fake to Alex then look left to Michael. He is wide open in the end zone. I threw it to Michael but before I could see what happened with the ball, I see Cody get shoved out of the way and one of their teams’ line backers comes running at me. He hit me hard and I black out. The next thing I knew, I was in the hospital.