Powder Puff is a traditional event between senior girls and female teachers, with the goal to raise school spirit. It also highlights women athletes. The school has many great female athletes who deserve to be recognized and celebrated for their abilities, or for their former abilities.

“We also play to support breast cancer awareness for the older women we have lost due to breast cancer,” English teacher Holland Primm said. “We wanted to win in order to defend our title, and also to prove to the girls and to ourselves that we can still be athletic.”

Even though it’s teachers versus senior girls, the teams will have both strengths and weaknesses. These were on display Oct. 31 on the field in front of friends and fans.

“Our strengths were our running ability,” senior Tabby Wilkes said, “and our weaknesses were that we can’t catch the ball. 

The teachers had three injuries on their team so their weaknesses were able to shine through during practices. In fact, English teacher Kami Carpenter broke her wrist. 

“Our team’s strength was teamwork and enthusiasm. We all love to play and we love to be part of Har-Ber’s many traditions, plus we’re friends, and that always helps,” Primm said. “Our weakness was definitely being more injury-prone–we’re not as young as we used to be!

“The teacher’s weakness was times for the practices, because the coach was a football player, so his practices didn’t end until 5 or 5:30 p.m.,” Carpenter said. “Another weakness was two of the teachers, including me, Ms. Bohannon bruised her knee and Ms. Sprague hurt her ribs pretty badly.”

On the senior girls side nobody got hurt. Most of the girls were either basketball players, track athletes, or soccer players. 

“My favorite play of the game was when I was running the ball into the end zone, and I absolutely trucked a teacher,” Wilkes said. 

Their bodies were well prepared for the game unlike the teachers whose bodies weren’t ready for the strenuous activity.

“I don’t work out or exercise much. I stretch before practices and before the game,” Sprague said. “Otherwise, I’m relying on sheer brute force. I love being out there with the girls, but it gets pretty physical. It’s so much fun. I look forward to playing every year.”  

Each year, the teachers choose some football players to help them with offensive schemes and running defense. The coaches for the senior girls team were also football players, though seniors. The teachers’ coaches, junior Mark Ballard and sophomore Stephen Shanks, used an NFL offense and defense playbook. Positions were numbered, teachers were assigned a number, and plays were called. 

“I used a play called LA Rams from Brent Eckley’s playbook from my sophomore and freshman year,” Ballard said. “It worked out pretty well, the teachers executed it pretty well, and we got some good yards off the play as well.”

The teachers hit the turf with a winning mindset, sure that age and experience would win. The senior girls went out with a mindset to beat the old ladies at flagged football. 

“We didn’t think we had it in the bag. We definitely thought we had a good chance. We knew the teachers hadn’t practiced as much, so that gave us an advantage,” senior Molly Rushton said. “In the end, we learned that the teachers’ preparation was a bit more productive.”  

Shanks was glad to have been brought onto the team. 

“I’m glad I got recruited to be a powder puff coach,” Shanks said. “Even though I’m a sophomore and the other coach was a junior, I took on the challenge and came up with the best plays and made the starting lineup, so we can have the teachers go whip the senior girls butt.”

By the way, the old ladies won the game.