It’s easy to tell where St. Mary’s stands on the powderpuff field. Look for the sea of blue and white.
Powderpuff has been an annual St. Mary’s and Hutchinson tradition since 2021. Each year, the two all-girls schools battle out their rivalry in a game of flag football coached by students from Memphis University School. The game is divided into four quarters — one for each grade level.
Sophomore Carmen McGhee came ready to cheer on St. Mary’s with her all-blue outfit.
“I’m wearing a blue St. Mary’s sweatshirt, a white-and-blue striped St. Mary’s shirt, blue beads, blue ribbon in my hair, a blue bandana on my head and my blue and white Jordans,” McGhee said.
Like McGhee, many other Turkeys including sophomore Annabelle Bradford searched their closet for blue to show their school spirit.
“Blue, baby. We represent the Turkeys in our blue,” Bradford said.
Hutchinson junior Harper Behnke, along with many others, dressed up as pilgrims to reference the killing the turkeys at Thanksgiving. Many Hutchinson girls wore camo and turkey-hunting gear, too.
“I’m wearing a pilgrim dress and a bonnet,” Behnke said. “You guys are the Turkeys, and we eat the Turkeys.”
The sidelines differed from each other, but the powderpuff players had uniforms that were set apart from both of them. Each St. Mary’s student participating in powderpuff gets a plain blue shirt that they customize. This tradition is similar to how students create their own shirts to wear on Derby Day.
Junior Amelia Block loved her team’s homemade jerseys.
“We have SMS on the front, and then we have our nicknames on the back with 26 [the junior’s graduating year],” Block said. “It’s specially made by us.”
With help from her dad, sophomore Aaliyah Sharif dusted off her Cricut and created her grade’s jerseys. Following the example of the senior class, the sophomores wore them last year and are planning to wear them for the next two powderpuff games as well.
This year’s powderpuff game also starred some new merch designed by Hutchinson senior Sadie Rosenblum. Students from both schools could purchase an official Hutchinson/St. Mary’s fan shirt for $16 to wear to the game. The shirts were a huge hit with 250 pre-orders and more sold at the game.
“I wanted to make a neutral powderpuff shirt for both the schools to wear to bring everyone together,” Rosenblum wrote in a text.
Powderpuff this year was an overall success for the Turkeys with wins from the freshmen, sophomores and seniors.
“So far the freshman crush[ed], the sophomores crush[ed]. We held our ground, somewhat,” Block said before the seniors took the field. “And the seniors are gonna crush.”
And they did. Leading the Turkeys to a 43-20 victory over Hutchinson.
