PEA RIDGE -- Miranda Morgan never shies away from contact, she embraces it.
"I just like the idea of being able to hit and not get in trouble for it," said Morgan. "I just like the sport. I always have."
The soft-spoken, grey-eyed young lady is tough. She is an offensive guard and defensive tackle on the Pea Ridge Blackhawks varsity football team and has played the male-dominated sport since she was in the fourth grade.
Whether in practice or in the weight room, Morgan does whatever the other Blackhawk athletes do.
She doesn't ask for favors.
She doesn't receive them.
Blackhawks coaches Tony Travis and Lafe Caton agreed Morgan does not get treated differently than her male teammates.
"The only accommodation is finding a locker room for her on away games," Travis said.
For home games, she uses the girls' locker room while the other players go across the room to the boys' locker room.
She played football with many of her teammates for the past seven years, first at the Pee-Wee level, then seventh-grade and into junior high football.
"In Pee-Wee, one kid didn't want to hit me because I'm a girl, but coach made him," she said, eyes sparkling.
She's had her share of contact-related injuries.
"When I was in Pee-Wee, I got my neck knocked out of place during a drill," she said. "My shoulder went lower than Britton's (Caudill) and his shoulder pad hit my neck."
Morgan, 15, the youngest of Guary and Cassie Morgan's three children, said she continued practice that day, then went to the doctor after practice.
"My mom took me. I couldn't practice and wore a neck brace for a week or two," she said.
Kamden Boyd, 15, is a sophomore on the Blackhawks' football team. He has played football with Morgan since fourth grade.
"She plays just like one of us. The effort is the same as all of us boys out there," Boyd said. "Whenever we go up against her, it's the same as going up against a guy. It doesn't matter.
"When you're on the field, you don't feel the difference. We've played together for so long, she's just a normal part of our team."
Pea Ridge trainer Jaimie Mann said Morgan is treated like any other athlete.
"I had her in seventh grade," Matt Easterling remembers. "She was just like any other athlete out there. Ozark had a girl on their team then, too."
Morgan said she has "always played football outside" with her older brother, Devin, 21. Her older sister, Anna Morgan, 17, runs cross country for the Blackhawks.
She admitted her parents occasionally express concern.
"Sometimes they get worried," she said. "But, they said if I want to play, they'll support me all the way."
Morgan plans to be an architect after high school.
When she's not in the weight room or on the football field, she is in the woods at her "Mimi's" house in Garfield or swimming.
"I like to fish. I like to draw. I like to watch football," she said.
Sports on 08/20/2014