How nine Oshkosh West girls ended up representing the Packers at NFL flag football finals

Nine girls from the Oshkosh West High School football team were selected to participate in last month’s NFL FLAG Championships at the Pro Football Hall of Fame as the Green Bay Packers team.

This was the first of its kind tournament, which had the participation of more than 280 teams and 11 divisions of girls and boys teams from different parts of the world, NFL FLAG regional champions from all over the United States for all the 32 NFL teams. The Packers organized their NFL FLAG regional on May, 18th at Don Hutson Center & Ray Nitschke Field.

The nine players were:

Incoming sophomore students are Andrea Czerwinski and Lauren Klinger.

The incoming juniors are Neva Schlies and Summer Zinsli.

Both Joely Schelfhout and Decorah Vienola are students of the incoming senior status.

Julia Lor and Paige Seckar (graduate seniors – both planning to attend the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh in the fall)

Kyana Williams (graduated senior – plans to go to UW Oshkosh in the Spring but taking a gap semester)

This was the only previous exposure that their female players had to football. .. and that was in powder puff games during homecoming week.

In fact, the girls only practiced a total of four times before the Green Bay regional and got second place, only to learn within the first week of June that the team which had beaten them in the championship round of the statewide competition had been disqualified; hence, they got an invitation to the nationwide competition.

“That was a bit of a barrier ― trying to get them together, get some plays installed, and prepare,” Alex Torres, an assistant on the Wildcats’ varsity football coaching staff, said and he was known to be the girls’ head coach.

A coach of basketball and a dean of students of Oshkosh west, Marina Kodet who also attended the event as an assistant.

The Packers arranged for reimbursement to team members of up to $5,000 for travel expenses , the team played four games which are two heal less games of twelve minutes each with running clock and three timeouts per game over two days.

On the way, the team was to stops by the Northwestern University and South Bend in Indiana, especially to the University of Notre Dame where the girls were able to take photograph with the mural commonly referred to as “Touchdown Jesus”.

The next day the girls played three pool play games against the other NFC North teams, Minnesota Vikings, Chicago Bears, and Detroit Lions; and then played in a seeded playoff bracket. Self, disputed, actuality, internationally broadcasted in 125 countries to ESPN’s Family of Networks.

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“We didn’t plan on being in this tournament, " Torres said. "We lost three girls and when I didn’t see them in school anymore I texted to check if they want to play.

Seckar is among the seniors who were called to join the team, she said she was “amazed at the environment of the whole thing”.

”(There were) so many people and different teams from all over the country and the world, it was just a neat thing to be a part of,” Seckar said. I never realized just how massive of an event flag football was until I went to one for myself, they even had teams from China, Australia, and even Europe, which was so awesome all in its own!

The girls’ initial match in the pool play was a one-touchdown defeat to the Vikings team from Minnesota; they were then defeated by shutout scores to teams from Michigan and Illinois.

In the playoff bracket, the girls bowed to a team from California and partner to San Francisco 49ers. The particular games Torres recalled was “an AAU-like team. ” RA stressed to a lay spectator, an over-the-shoulder catch twice by one of their opponents illustrated that they were qualitatively different and the girls were defeated.

“It was evident that these girls can play and are enthusiasts of football,” Torres said. “Teams were attempting to rush and get goals and everyone knew this was a game of possession The other teams managed to transfer the ball to the other end quite often but Crescent Valley seemed to have a problem with that. ”

While the girls did not get a chance to celebrate on the home field of Canton defeating the opposing team, the game and the fun it brought them was good enough for the trip.

“Our games could have been better” Seckar said “But we have only been playing for about three months considering we only practice once a week, while the other teams have been playing together since childhood; We went 0-4, but did our best, learned more about the game, and most importantly had fun that was our goals going into it we left with smiles on our faces” Below are some of his experiences on the trip Some

Besides the nice gifts, the girls were kindly taken to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. In their final moments, they met the former Green Bay Packers’ player LeRoy Butler, the creator of the Lambeau Leap and the member of the Class of 2022 NFL Hall of Fame, accidentally on his birthday.

”The other favorite part was visiting the Pro Football Hall of Fame,” added Seckar, who will play basketball for the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh this upcoming winter.

“We were given free tickets since we are on the nationals team and so we spent like 2 hours taking a tour around as a team and because it was something I actually liked probably because we may not know so many of them but it was such a lovely time. I’m always in the basketball court but then last weekend I got a chance to have a tour round it and I’m grateful I got the chance. ”

Apart from meeting Butler, the involvement of the girls also resulted into meeting other NFL Hall of Famer Joe DeLamielleure, who according to Torres was very engaging to the girls and spent a lot of of time discussing with the girls about his experiences in the NFL, and NFL Super Bowl XXXVII champion Ronde Barber.