Hail Mary, Britni De La Cretaz
Hail Mary, Britni De La Cretaz
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Hail Mary
The Rise and Fall of the National Women's Football League

Author: Britni De La Cretaz, Lyndsey D'Arcangelo

Narrator: Kimberly Austin

Unabridged: 9 hr 37 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/21/2021


Synopsis

In 1967, a Cleveland businessman had a brilliant idea: why not start a women's football team? It was conceived as a gimmick and a publicity stunt in the vein of the Harlem Globetrotters. He recruited women to compete as a traveling football troupe; much to his surprise, he learned that women really wanted to play—and play hard. Hail Mary is the story of the unlikely rise of the National Women's Football League and the players who loved a game that society told them they shouldn't be playing. In nineteen cities around the country, against the backdrop of second-wave feminism and the passage of Title IX, these athletes broke new barriers and showed adoring crowds what women were capable of physically. Thousands of people came to watch—perhaps to gawk at first but then, in the end, to cheer. Hail Mary is a rollicking chronicle of fearless women-players on the Detroit Demons, the Toledo Troopers, the LA Dandelions, and more—bringing us into the stadiums where they broke records, the small-town lesbian bars where they were recruited, and the backrooms where the league was conceived, and where it ended. Hail Mary is a celebration of women athletes and their fight on and off the field—and a powerful story of the league that changed their lives and the course of women's sports.

About Britni De La Cretaz

Britni de la Cretaz is a freelance writer who focuses on the intersection of sports and gender. A former sports columnist for Longreads and Bitch Media, they received the 2017 Nellie Bly Award for Investigative Journalism from the Transformative Culture Project for their work on racism in Boston sports media and were nominated for the 2019 SABR Analytics Research Award for their writing on the queer history of women's baseball for Narratively. They live in the Boston area.

About Lyndsey D'Arcangelo

Lyndsey D'Arcangelo writes about women's college basketball and the WNBA for The Athletic. Her articles, columns, and profiles on female/LGBTQ+ athletes have appeared in a wide range of outlets. She received a Notable Mention in the 2018 Best American Sports Writing anthology for her story "My Father, Trump and The Buffalo Bills." She lives in Buffalo, New York.

About Kimberly Austin

Kimberly Austin is a professional actor, narrator, and voiceover artist who specializes in romance and young-adult novels. When not narrating, she enjoys performing on-stage and in improv and sketch comedy.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Allison

Hail Mary welcomes readers to 1970s-80s women's football in the NWFL. We find ourselves in an era fresh with Title IX when many women hadn't experienced organized, athletic opportunities in school, and if they did, it certainly wasn't football, that hypermasculine ideal of tackling, getting down in......more

Goodreads review by Melanie

A fascinating history on a little-remembered sports league that quietly served as the catalyst for so many women's sports today. De la Cretaz and D'Arcangelo not only bring heart and life to these histories but dissect why women's professional sports leagues continue to struggle for recognition and......more

Goodreads review by Leah

The National Women's Football League was born into the early years of Title IX, when women playing sports at all was considered a novelty, and often a burden. The players had all grown up in an era where women were afforded very few job opportunities and very little independence of any kind. The des......more

I couldn't tell you anything about the rules of football beyond the absolute, bare-bones basics, but this was a great read. Hail Mary tells the untold story of the National Women's Football League and the tough women who took the field. Although football is known as a man's game through and through,......more