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The Minnesota Vixen won their championship game against the Pittsburgh Passion 42-14 last month, with Edy Halverson of Mendota Heights contributing a touchdown to the effort.
“I don’t know if I would have ever thought about bringing home a national championship, especially at my age of 19. It’s not something many people can say,” Halverson said. “It’s cool seeing people win big trophies like that. But it’s even better being on the team and winning it yourself.”
It was Halverson’s rookie year for the Minnesota Vixen, a team that’s been around since 1999 and is now part of the Women’s Football Alliance (WFA), the largest women’s tackle football league in the world. Halverson, a tight end, had 12 catches for 121 yards and three touchdowns this season. She’s in the top 20 in the league this season for yardage and fourth on the Vixen.
Joining the Team
Last year at this time, Halverson didn’t even know about the Vixen. An ad on her phone piqued her curiosity, though she figured tryouts wouldn’t fit in her schedule. But tryouts were the next day and she had a weekend off.
“I didn’t have anything else going on, so I grabbed my cleats and drove down to the Cities for the weekend,” said Halverson, who attends the University of Minnesota Duluth. She tried out, and a week later the team offered her a spot. “The rest is history.”
Eight months later and Halverson is a champion.
Youngest Player
At 19, Halverson is the youngest player on the team. That meant missing out on some of the celebrations that included alcohol, but Halverson shrugged it off. While she couldn’t always celebrate with her teammates, she definitely looks up to them.
“They all know a lot more than me. Not just in football, but also life,” Halverson said. “They’ve been around longer and they’ve gone through more challenges. They’ve had success. They’ve had failures.”
She sees all of her teammates as mentors and would feel comfortable asking any of them for help or advice.
Women’s Sports
Women’s sports seem to be having a moment—the rise of the PWHL and this year’s Olympic gold in hockey, the WNBA salary agreement, women’s pro baseball starting. The WFA championship game was broadcast on ESPN2 with a watch party at A Bar of Their Own in Minneapolis.
“Not many people thought about or pay attention to women’s sports, but it’s fun seeing them actually doing well compared to the men’s teams,” Halverson said.
The Vixen’s title adds to the growing championship count for women’s sports in Minnesota with five for the Lynx and two for the Frost.
But championships aren’t the only difference between men’s and women’s sports. Salary is a big difference. The WFA is pay-to-play league where players pay dues and provide their own equipment. The team pays for some hotels, but players pay for their own transportation. “It adds up quick,” Halverson said.
“It’s a lot of time and a lot of money,” Halverson said. “I’d like to keep doing it, but…” She trails off.
Another difference is facilities. While the Vikings practice in the $90 million TCO Performance Center in Eagan, the Vixen practice at Matson Field in West St. Paul.
Another difference? The Vixen’s 53-year-old Cynthia ‘Red’ Bryant is a grandmother. She’s either played or coached for the team since 1999. How many NFL players are grandparents? Only two in history, Brett Favre at age 40 in 2010 and Philip Rivers last year at 44. But neither won a championship as a grandparent.
It’s a difficult juxtaposition where male athletes earn millions while women have to pay to play.
So what motivates Halverson to keep playing? “I just grew up a very competitive person,” she said. “I’ve always loved sports since I was little.”
It brings new meaning to ‘love of the game’. But Halverson is optimistic that change is coming.
“Especially now that we just won the championship, more people are starting to know about it, and I think they’ll start to see that women’s sports are going to be the ones to watch,” Halverson said. “Then they’re going to start realizing we’re not getting paid. Then over time, more and more people will start fighting for change. Even if it grows only a little over time, it’s gonna keep getting bigger.”
Football History
Halverson is new to tackle football, having last played in kindergarten with the West Side Boosters. “I think there was one other girl on my team,” she said. “All the rest were boys.”
But she did play flag football during her senior year at Two Rivers High School, when the team went to state in dramatic fashion in the program’s opening year. Halverson was disappointed they didn’t have a flag football team earlier.
Switching from flag to tackle football was more of a mental challenge than a physical one. “The hardest part for me at least was definitely the mental side and memorizing all the plays,” Halverson said. She described flag football as more technical.
She definitely likes tackle better. “The contact part just makes it more fun,” she said. “You’re always doing something on every single play in tackle football.”
Sports Background
While she’s new to tackle football, she’s hardly a sports novice. She played hockey and soccer starting in elementary school through high school, and now plays soccer for the University of Minnesota Duluth.
“I just like doing something all the time,” Halverson said. “Being outside or staying active, being with teammates, friends.”
After hockey success in high school, including winning the Hobey Baker Character Award, Halverson isn’t playing competitively anymore. She’ll play on the rink in her family’s yard or pick up games. Sometimes she misses it, but she does not miss the long hockey season.
Halverson is committed to soccer for school, so that gets the priority. But with sports stretching to year round with practices and training, it still required a lot of juggling.
“I went to practices through the whole week for soccer, and then in the spring we had weekends off, so on Friday night after class I would drive down to the Cities, go to football practice on Saturday, then drive back up,” she said.
The hardest part was memorizing all the plays: “It was more homework on top of my homework already,” she said.
Which is better, football or soccer? “If it’s soccer season, obviously soccer,” Halverson said. “But when it’s football season, football season’s more fun.”
Halverson is drawn to the constant action of contact sports: “Every time you’re on the field, you’re always doing something compared to the non-physical sports. It’s like sometimes you’re just there, sometimes you’re just waiting around. But during these, you’re always on someone. You’re always doing something.”
Education/Future
Halverson is studying elementary education and special education at the University of Minnesota Duluth. As a 2025 Two Rivers graduate, Halverson received a Thrive With Us scholarship from ISD 197, a mentorship program that will bring Halverson back to teach in ISD 197 after she graduates.
“It’s just a way of getting people to become special education teachers, which obviously everyone’s in need of them right now,” Halverson said.
“I like it because it’s nothing new. You’re already kind of used to them,” she said. “This definitely helps calm the nerves.”
Try New Things
“I never thought I would be on this team until I tried, and I never even knew if I would like it or not until I tried,” Halverson said. “Now I love football and love the people that are on the team.”
That’s Halverson’s advice for female athletes—try it.
“With all the women’s sports success, I’d say that the future is bright for young kids, older women, anyone really,” Halverson said. “So I’d say just go try it.”
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(Photos courtesy of the Minnesota Vixen)
