Powderpuff — the football game that (almost) everyone looks forward to. At UC High, it’s a flag football event where junior and senior girls get the chance to compete against each other. It has a variety of purposes, and it is not solely meant to be entertainment. But the purpose is definitely not for the participants to get violent with each other. Hey UC High, let’s make a commitment that the incidents that happened at last year’s game never happen again, so that Powderpuff can remain an important tradition at UC High.

   Powderpuff is believed to have begun as early as 1931. In one high school during this era, there were few available male football players for the Homecoming game as a result of the wartime military draft. Not wanting to miss out on a school tradition, the community suggested that an all-girls team play in their place. Despite condemnation over its unorthodox nature, the all-female team was approved. Since then, Powderpuff has become a tradition at schools such as UC High and is often used to raise money (revolvy.com). Senior Lula Cotsirilos, who participated in last year’s Powderpuff game, explained that Powderpuff is “…a good way to get school spirit roused and bring everyone together, because they’re taking a sport that mostly guys play and then letting the girls play as well.”

   According to Senior Megan Tatro, last year’s Powderpuff game got a little out of hand, leading to rumors of the event being taken away for the 2017-’18 school year. “During the game some people started pushing, shoving, and overall breaking rules. The drama built off of that, and the whole game went downhill,” she said. It was an isolated situation caused by the events of that specific game, and a repeat will not happen because of the sportsmanship generally displayed by UC High students.

   There are rules in place to keep injuries from happening, and they will be followed. “For example, you can’t hold, you can’t make certain moves after plays are over, and when the whistle blows you have to stop touching or pushing the girls — even though you’re not supposed to push in the first place,” added Tatro. Since Powderpuff is flag football, no tackling is allowed. Players do not take other players down to the ground, but instead pull off the colored flags around the other person’s waist to stop them. This helps create a non-invasive sport that decreases the chances of violence or injury (healthfully.com). If it were proposed to allow girls to play tackle football, according to the Public Broadcasting System, then equipment would have to be provided to prevent any sort of accident (pbs.org).

   On average, high school football players suffer 11.2 concussions for every 10,000 games and practices. However, Powderpuff only allows flag pulling, so if players make the commitment to follow the rules, there will be no purposeful injuries. Let’s hope that this commitment will encourage the UC High administration not to take away the chance for girls to play football (with very limited physical contact).

   Water polo, volleyball, badminton, soccer, basketball, field hockey, lacrosse, golf, tennis, baseball and softball. All of these sports have both female and male teams. Why can’t football be part of this group? Even for just one day… Powderpuff occurs once a year. Please don’t let an incident from last year’s game keep a whole new class of students from participating in a greatly anticipated, and much loved, event.