Bella and the Bobcats

Eli Schwartzman

Bella McKenna and the South Windsor Bobcats froshmore team

“I’ve always wanted to play football since I was a little girl. Last year, I really wanted to play, but I got nervous and decided to play volleyball instead,” Bella said. An estimated 2,404 women played organized tackle football in the United States last year, while roughly 5.16 million men played football. 

According to Bella, “Farmington’s players tried to act maturely about playing against a girl, but some players didn’t handle it so well. They overall acted fine about it, but they were definitely treating me more easily than the guys. Number 29 on Farmington basically let me tackle him.” 

“If someone wants to tell me it’s weird for a girl to play football, I will just honestly tell them that if they have a problem with me being on the team, they should just keep it to themselves and walk away. There’s plenty of women who play in men’s sport leagues all over the world, so I don’t see a problem with me playing football” Bella said.

Head football Coach David Hodge said, “I feel no different having a girl on the team than having a boy,” Aiden Sadda, a teammate of Bella’s said. “I think it’s really cool that we have diversity like that on the team. She’s a really good teammate”. 

While the Farmington players barely even tackled Bella. The Bristol Central froshmore team was not as light. On Bella’s first rushing attempt of the season, she ran a jet sweep around the right side of the offensive line, only to be met instantly by Bristol Central’s #13. Bella got buried into the ground, one of the hardest hits in the game. Instead of staying down on the grass crying, she jumped right back up and continued to play the game.