New team looks to be Force in women's football
PITTSBURGH — The Pittsburgh Passion aren't enough. At least, not for the women who want to play football.
Knoch graduate Brandi DeMarco and Zelienople resident Heather Andrews will play this season for the Pittsburgh Force, a newly created team that will play in the Women's Football League.
The Passion left the WFL last year to play in the Independent Women's Football League.
"There were 150 players on the Passion last year, but only 55 were allowed to suit up for a game," DeMarco said. "If you were down a ways on the depth chart, you didn't have much chance."
Such was the case with punter-kicker DeMarco, who decided to jump to the Force once former Passion receiver-cornerback Kathy Ferrari decided to form the team.
"I was going to buy a house. Instead, I bought a football team," Ferrari said. "There was a need for this."
The Force will play its home games at Ambridge High School. Home dates include May 9 vs. Cincinnati, May 16 vs. Columbus, May 30 vs. Cleveland and June 13 vs. West Virginia.
The roster consists of 45 to 50 players, with nearly 10 coming over from the Passion.
"Numbers were a problem for a lot of the girls (with the Passion)," DeMarco said. "There may have been five players at your position, and if you got hurt, you dropped to the bottom of the list."
DeMarco played soccer at Knoch and softball during the summer. She played hockey for the Pittsburgh Puffins women's team and played rugby in college at New Mexico State.
Her transition to football was easy.
"I'm from Pittsburgh. Who doesn't love football around here? We were born to play football," she said.
DeMarco has been working with Pitt kicker Connor Lee and her range on field goals has reached 40 yards.
"My punting still needs work," she admitted.
While most of the Force roster is new to the game and the team opens the season April 18 at Columbus — a team that won a game 96-0 last year — its players are confident of immediate success.
Andrews, the anticipated starting quarterback, is a big reason why."I never thought I'd see another quarterback like (Slippery Rock University graduate) Lisa Horton with the Passion, but Heather looks fantastic in practice," Ferrari said."Her ball fakes out of the option are outstanding and she's a natural athlete."Andrews graduated from Riverside High School and was an all-Big East catcher in softball for Pitt. She had surgery on her rotator cuff after her freshman year in college.A 2004 Pitt graduate, Andrews admitted to a yearning for competition since then."After college, I felt like a piece of my life was missing," she said. "I watched the Passion play on TV a couple of times and decided I wanted to do this."I can see myself playing for a number of years."Noted for a strong arm behind the plate, Andrews has made the transition to throwing a football."I really haven't cut it loose yet, but I can throw a football from wall to wall in a basketball gym rather easily," she said.Defensive end Melina Wallace described Andrews as "dedicated and driven. She puts in her study time and she's quick to change it up at the line of scrimmage."Her execution of our plays on offense is very impressive."The Force have been practicing three or four times a week since January. When the team held a tryout session at Chartiers Valley, three women showed up.At a tryout session in Cranberry Township, 22 women participated."There is new talent out there," Ferrari said. "I wanted to bring in new women. If we only got 20 girls, I would have folded the team."But we've had more than 60 try out for the team and the Passion still has 70 players. I love the Passion. We're not competing with them."Our goal is to have two great women's football teams in Pittsburgh. It can happen," Ferrari added.
