Landrie Walsh went out for the cheer team at Bridgeport High School to get the best seat in the house for the football games. She was an All-Wise County basketball player, but the most recognition she received on the cheer squad was her coach calling her out for not sticking to the routine.

“I would get in trouble a lot for not paying attention to the cheer,” Walsh said. “But I was confused because we’re in second-and-goal on the other end. Shouldn’t we be cheering to score?”

Walsh wishes she could go back in time with her current knowledge. She’d tell that high school senior who loved football that football had space for her in college and beyond. Maybe she’d drop a book on her desk, filled page after page with all the jobs women could work in a sport coached and played by men. 

Because back when she began her freshman year at Texas A&M, she didn’t know it was possible until a friend on the Aggie Dance team connected her with the dance coach, Holly Reedy, who also served in football operations. From there, Walsh worked her way up into an On-Campus Recruiting Coordinator job at A&M, then Baylor’s Director of On-Campus Recruiting, and finally, Texas A&M’s Director of Recruiting. 

Today is Early Signing Day, the Super Bowl of recruiting. And women share the credit with the coaches for every signature on a National Letter of Intent. All 13 FBS programs in Texas began the season with at least one woman in the recruiting department. They plan all the recruiting and on-campus visits, constantly putting out logistical firestorms while developing relationships with the recruits’ families.

Walsh can’t reach into the past, but she can change the future outlook for girls like her from her new platform as the Director of Football Operations at Baylor University. She’s one of a plethora of women making game days possible. There’s Deputy Athletic Director Jovan Overshown, Keava Soil-Cormier in NIL Administration and Pro Relations, Director of Player Personnel Callie Cameron, Madelyn Martin as the assistant to the head coach and Taylor Halsey as Director of On-Campus Recruiting.

She and her team are proof to those girls who love football that while women dominate recruiting, they’re spreading to other vital support positions in college athletic departments.

“It’s not as much of a reach (for women) anymore to say, ‘Hey, I want to work in operations,’” Walsh said. “Or ‘I want to work in personnel.’ They see people in those roles now.”

In terms of seeing people, the Houston football players see Director of Performance Nutrition Emily England almost as often as their position coaches. England jokes she has 115 kids. She’s at the facility at 5 a.m. every morning watching what the players grab for breakfast, then on the practice field helping them hydrate before walking them through what they need to eat for lunch to recover.

Add in body composition measurements and hydration testing, as well as keeping track of everyone’s food allergies and intolerances, and England knows what the players need before they know they need it. 

“When you’re around 115 people for at least 12 hours, sometimes 15 hours a day, you learn things about people they probably don’t think that you know about them,” England said.

England stays motivated through the long hours by reminding herself she’s a small piece of the players reaching their goal of making the NFL. 

“She’s the greatest,” tight end Jayden York said. “Without her, everybody would be laid out on the field. There would be no team without Emily.”

Sports nutritionists and dieticians have a high female population because of the job’s similarities to nursing. Studying nutritionists undergo a lot of clinical work in hospitals and outpatient care clinics. With the boom of performance nutrition in college athletics, more women are finding roles within a football program. 

“For the longest time, it’s been the world of, ‘Men are going to work in men’s sports and women can work in women’s sports,’ and it’s just not that way anymore,” England said. “You can pull so much experience and knowledge from people in general. It doesn’t matter what gender you are.”

Social media is another area of expertise that women bring to a college staff. Allison Maguire became a student worker with the UTSA football team and was named creative content coordinator this August. 

While she likens this season to tumbling down a hill, having three weeks of fall camp to get most of their campaigns off the ground, Maguire says the department’s creation was long in the works. She credits UTSA head coach Jeff Traylor for understanding the value and reach social media can have in growing a brand. 

“This has been something Coach Traylor has wanted for a long time,” Maguire said. “The first thing he did when he was building his staff - before he looked at coaches - was look for a graphic designer.”

Not only do graphic designs and social media help the football program’s brand awareness, but they also allow fans to get to know their teams outside the football field. One of Maguire’s initiatives was posting UTSA’s Monday meetings on the team’s culture pillars, and she also enjoys showing off the players’ personalities with photos and short videos.  

A common misconception about her job is that Traylor scrolls the social media accounts for tips on his halftime adjustments. 

“Y’all can tell me every game what you want us to run, but I’m not telling Coach Traylor what to do,” Maguire said. 

While Maguire expands her football team’s footprint online, SMU Assistant Director of Football Relations Kinsey Landry makes inroads within the community. She and her boss, Megan Farraguti, recently partnered with the Dallas Police Department and South Oak Cliff High School to host a turkey giveaway on SOC’s campus that the entire SMU football team attended.

The event allowed SMU’s athletes to return for charity work in the communities they were raised in while also backing up SMU’s slogan as Dallas’ Team with action. 

“We have all these guys we’ve signed out of high school that are from Duncanville and DeSoto,” Landry said. “We have kind of an All-Texas/Dallas team, which is unifying what SMU is supposed to be."