The Blurgh

This afternoon was one of the best times I’ve had in my life. Normally, at the Pittsburgh Women’s Foundation, I work with girls who enjoy creative writing, but occasionally I’ll pitch in with the girls on sports teams as well. (I was pretty good at volleyball and soccer back in my day, though the girls who come to PWF for sports could have wiped the floor with my fifth grade self.) Anyway, this afternoon I, along with two of my colleagues, got to take 10 of the PWF girls to the North Side to meet the two new female coaches for the Steelers.

We all rode the blue line together to the North Side. Once we got off the subway, we walked the few blocks to Heinz Field. It was kind of slow going, because Samara’s still on crutches, but we arrived just in time to be greeted by some very chipper Steelers representatives, who escorted us up to one of the luxury boxes. The girls were enthralled with the box and took turns sitting on every piece of furniture in it. Then they started pretending that half of them were hot shot sports agents and the other half were star athletes being courted by the Steelers, so there was a lot of silly exchanges about trillion dollar offers and all the Faygo pop endorsements you could dream of.

A few minutes later, the two coaches entered the box and a hush fell over the girls. The special teams coach, Maddie Byers, spoke first about her experiences playing high school football in rural Texas and the prejudice she encountered in the community as a black girl who wanted to play football with the guys. She ended up breaking her school’s record for longest punt return during her sophomore year, and everyone in her town stopped complaining about her and started celebrating her. In college, she excelled once again on her school’s football team, but during her senior year she decided that what she really wanted to do was coach, so she started out as a coach for her own college’s team and worked her way up from there to her present position with the Steelers.

Next we heard from Elizabeth McGraw, the defensive backs coach. She is one tough woman. Like Maddie, she was a star athlete during her high school years, although Elizabeth was a kicker who comes from northern Ohio. She received an athletic scholarship to college and played on her school’s team until halfway through her junior year, when she was injured. She didn’t want to lose her scholarship, so her school offered her the opportunity to begin working with the team as a coach. She learned more about the defensive side of things in football and became really interested in it. After college, she coached a women’s football team in Ohio and then came to Pennsylvania to coach for the Pittsburgh Passion. A few years later, the Rooneys approached her about the defensive backs coaching position and she accepted it.

After the women spoke, lunch was served and the girls peppered the coaches with tons of questions. They were so excited to be sitting with women who were living out their dreams of one day making a living in the world of professional sports. The coaches were very gracious and patient with the girls. After lunch, we all trooped down to the field, where the coaches helped the girls with their techniques. We left to go back to the PWF around 4 and made our way to the subway, the girls chattering the whole way about what teams they want to coach for when they grow up.