Sorority Rush: Football with a woman's touch
The Daily Mississippian
COLUMN - Sorority Rush: Football with a woman's touch
by Steven Godfrey
The Life
September 30, 2004
It was in several conversations with several different young ladies this week that I finally discovered what sorority Rush was – a many splendid thing.
Hang on now. Six years, you’re thinking. Six years and he’s going to do another “Rush is the end of mankind” column.
No, sir. My eyes have been opened to a world previously unknown. What I once saw as the epitome of elitist Aryan class warfare has become something so unbelievably admirable that I would pay anything for a front row seat to witness its events.
To be succinct: Men talk about football. Women talk about Rush. And it’s the same thing. For instance, one girl in question explained to me that she was a “blue floater.” Huh? She explained that “blue” designated which groups of prospective she would greet, based on their hometowns in relation to where she was from. As a “floater” she wasn’t attached to one single girl, but instead provided backup or assistance to either help or block out girls. Another showed off bruises (injuries?) from working on the door song.
And then came my moment of clarity: Such organization and effort. Schemes reliant on individual’s strengths and familiarities...it was like the vaunted image of great gridiron coaches pacing a humid stretch of grass mashed together with a berserk jaunt through a J. Crew catalog and a spray-tan booth. There was Bear Bryant, in a strapless pastel sundress and matching sandals blowing kisses and barking orders for a stronger contain on first round prospects, and that the punch bowl was empty. Worlds had collided, and I realized that I either A: had stumbled onto something previously unseen or B: really needed a vacation.
But it all makes so much beautiful sense to me know. Rush is no more chaotic or preferential than a well-organized game plan. To listen to the intricacies of these strategies – the maneuvering, the sequential goals, the man-on-man (or girl-on-girl) coverage schemes, it was like listening to the greatest football mastermind in the world decipher the perfect game plan. Quotas as scores, grades as stats. That “blue floater?” A whip safety. The female instinct of multi-layered evaluation periods are normally seen as an obtuse mind frame to a man.
We supposedly spend the better part of our marriages befuddled as to why we did what we did when we don’t know what the hell what we did was. But such multi-angled logic and coded communication is no different than the NFL Draft. War rooms spend weeks picking apart the strengths and weaknesses of candidates, scouts are sent out to pick apart mechanics, and then over one hellish weekend, deals are made, plans schemed and selections fulfilled.
Except in sorority Rush, draft day is game day. Fleets of active members attack prospects both wanted and unwanted with a detailed game plan. Blue chip recruits are hit with the dink and dunk name-dropping and handshaking, a la the famously well-timed West Coast Offense of Bill Walsh. Individual greetings and conversations seem harmless, but their well-paced sequential execution combines to a quick score.
Blacklisted girls? They’re kept in a solid contain that prevents any kind of big play. Immediately hit not only by the front line of defenders but swarming reserves (line-backers, get it?), they still can’t see daylight, as even more ardent defenders are hanging deep in the wide expanse of the living room, protecting the end zone (valued rushees). In other words, it’s Monte Kiffin’s famed version of the Cover-2 scheme. And the initial door swarm during each round? Nothing less than a perfect example of a zero-coverage blitz, wherein more defenders are brought than can be contained by the offense.
Think of it this way: If we televised sorority Rush with football parameters, you’d combine the gritty competition of the NFL and the eye candy of America’s best looking co-eds (I’ve been to a lot of campuses doing this job, I know). Think of the possibilities:
AL MICHAELS: Lining up a flanker tonight is Mary-Faye-Anne-Beth Matthews, a third year floater from Clarksdale. Matthews is coming off a strong 2003 campaign in which she totalled 14 rushees and two solid blacklists. Hampered by three calls to standards after a vomiting incident at formal, Matthews says she’s eliminated outside distractions, including a clingy law school boyfriend, and feels at home in the new offensive scheme.
JOHN MADDEN: You gotta love sisters like Mary-Faye-Anne-Beth. She harkens back to the old school tea-and-gloves era with hard hitting tackles on first-rounders and a commanding presence in the living room. Boom! She’s in there with a solid outfit and a big smile on every play.
Outside of sports and war, men are by no means this effective. Be it any masculine grouping – childhood tree fort, college fraternity, company softball team – guys essentially work in the canine ethic of wandering around sniffing each other’s asses, and if the smell checks out, they’ll run together in a pack. Women, however, are social offensive coordinators of the highest caliber. Steve’s Spurrier’s Fun and Gun ain’t got nothing on a well-timed door song.
So I take it back: Sorority girls do know football; they’re just not letting on. By the time the Egg Bowl rolls around and you’re griping in the stands about a botched counter-trap or halfback option, they’ll bat their pretty eyes as if they’re clueless. But deep down, they’ve already completed their season with a glorious victory.
The “Loves our Rebels stickers” is an adhesive Lombardi trophy, and they’ve hoisted it high in stilettos and Gucci. They know exactly what you’re talking about when a five-wide set hits the field, because they’ve already done it to perfection on an invisible upper-class social gridiron unseen by us lumbering apes. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but guys, they’ve got it on us.
By all means: Game on, ladies. Game on.
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