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Toni Harris Just Made History As One of the First Women Awarded a Football Scholarship


Women have been shattering glass ceilings in sports for decades. Female athletes have set make-your-head-spin records, fought for equal pay, and pushed boundaries to make their sports even better. But football—a sport that is almost completely male-dominated on the field at every level—often feels stuck in the past. Antoinette “Toni” Harris, a college football player in Los Angeles, is helping to change that—she’s just been awarded a historic scholarship to play football at Central Methodist University in Missouri.

Harris, who plays free safety, is the first woman ever to land a scholarship to play defense—and in what is known in the sport as a seriously skilled and tough position, no less. (She also starred in a Super Bowl ad earlier this year.) This is only the second college football scholarship that’s ever been awarded a woman; In 2017, kicker Becca Longo became the first when she signed to play for Adams State University. (Around a dozen women have played football in college, but none on scholarship prior to Longo, according to ESPN.)

For the past two years, Harris has been crushing it on the field for a community college in Los Angeles, which is what got her noticed by the six (!) schools who offered her scholarships. This week, she made it official and signed a letter of intent to play for Central Methodist University, a Division I NAIA school.

Harris’ historic achievement was hard-won. She was kicked off numerous teams from little league to middle school, she says. But she kept fighting to play. “My biggest pet peeve is people telling me that I can’t,” Harris told NBC News. “So I have to prove them wrong.”

Harris has always believed that no matter where she played, if she was talented enough the right people would find her—and she was right. “They don’t want females to play in this sport, and so if you want the chance, you do have to be so good they can’t ignore you,” she says. She even has the mantra tattooed on her right side along with an NFL football, since playing in the pros is her ultimate dream. “I don’t let anything stop me. I don’t take no for an answer,” Harris says.

What makes Harris’ journey to the college football history books even more impressive is the fact that she’s an ovarian cancer survivor, having been diagnosed with the disease at 18. She credits her family and her faith with getting her through the fight, which caused her to lose half her body wait. “I did want to give up,” she says. “I thought things were over.”

After taking the field at CMU, Toni Harris hopes to go on to play in the NFL. “If it doesn’t happen, I can just pave the way for another little girl to come out and play—or even start a women’s NFL,” Harris told NBC. That’s a league we could definitely get behind.



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14 Books to Read in Honor of Black History Month


We’re one week into Black History Month 2019. And to celebrate, we turned to some of the most brilliants writers and thinkers of color we know to recommend some of their favorite books.

From collections of poems, to poignant YA page-turners, to bonafide classics, the books in this list are a testament to the varied, creative expressions of the black experience. The real question? Which one to pick up first. But don’t stress too much about where to start. Because while this month will be over in a few short weeks, these books will still be here to inspire, thrill, educate, and move readers no matter the season.



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Kendall Coyne Schofield Made History as the First Woman to Compete in the NHL All-Star Skills Contest


U.S. Olympic gold medalist Kendall Coyne Schofield made sports history on Friday night as the first woman ever to compete in the NHL All-Star Game SuperSkills Competition, an event that shows off the talent of some of the best professional hockey players.

In the past, the annual tradition has been reserved for male players in the league. But when Colorado Avalanche center Nathan MacKinnon had to drop out of the competition because of a foot injury, his team tapped Coyne Schofield to replace him. Coyne Schofield, who is a member of the U.S. women’s national ice hockey team and won a gold medal in 2018, jumped at the chance—and on Friday, she hit the ice, ready to fly.

“It was a no-brainer,” she said. “Obviously, it’s huge honor to be the first woman to take part in the NHL Skills competition. It was surreal.”

Coyne Schofield kicked things off by opening the fast skate event and ended up securing a lightning-quick time of 14.346 seconds. She landed in seventh place ahead of Arizona Coyotes player Clayton Keller, while Edmonton Oilers Connor McDavid won first place and his third title in the event. But to Coyne Schofield, what was important was changing the rules of the hockey competition.

“My first impression was, like, ‘I can do this,’” Coyne Schofield said at a news conference after the event. “My speed is definitely my strength. Obviously, I was a little nervous, but I knew it was a moment that was going to break a lot of barriers, and a moment that would change the perceptions of our game.”

Coyne Schofield wowed a lot of the hockey world, including MacKinnon, the player she replaced.

“It’s amazing, her stride,” he said on NBC Sports Network. “She is so powerful.”

Others sang Coyne Schofield’s praises and noted what a significant moment her skate was for women in hockey.

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Ariana Grande Just Made Coachella History


Coachella just announced its 2019 festival lineup, and it’s stacked. Childish Gambino, Tame Impala, and—drum roll, please— Ariana Grande will steer the ship for the festival’s two weekends. With this, Grande becomes only the fourth female headliner in Coachella’s history—and the youngest female artist to receive top billing. (She’s joining ranks with Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, and Björk.)

Thankfully, several female artists will play Coachella over its two-week span. Janelle Monáe, Kacey Musgraves, Lizzo, Maggie Rogers, and the K-Pop band Blackpink all secured spots in the festival. Another exciting addition to the list is transgender DJ Sophie, who’s produced music for Madonna and Charli XCX and earned a Grammy nomination this year for her own album Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides.

Check out the full lineup for yourself, below:

“Humbled and excited as all hell @coachella thank u,” Grande wrote on Instagram to celebrate securing the gig.
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It’s shaping up to be a busy 2019 for Grande. The singer is reportedly releasing another album—aptly titled Thank U, Next—early in the year and will embark on her Sweetener World Tour this coming March. Her song “Thank U, Next” is still holding strong at number one on Billboard‘s Hot 100.

“I’m really looking forward to embracing whatever happens and whatever comes my way,” Grande said in December while accepting the award for Billboard magazine’s Woman of the Year. “I’m really grateful for my friends and family, I love you guys so much. I’m really grateful for music.”

Coachella will take place over the weekends of April 12 and April 19, so mark your calendars. Click here for more information.

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Miss Universe Is Making History with the Pageant's First Openly Trans Contestant


When Angela Ponce takes the stage during this year’s Miss Universe pageant—all tan lithe limbs and radiant blowout in a hot pink bikini—it’s easy to see why she’s favored to win the competition, currently underway in Thailand. Tall, blonde, soft-spoken and impeccably glamorous, she’s a walking archetype of what you might imagine one Donald J. Trump envisioning as the perfect pageant queen. (He owned Miss Universe from 1996 to 2015.) But Ponce, who currently holds the title of Miss Spain 2018, is much more representative of the pageant’s future than its past—she’s the first openly transgender woman to ever compete for the crown.

Ponce during the swimwear portion of the preliminary Miss Universe competition in Bangkok.

Amorn Pitayanant

The very fact of Ponce’s candidacy is historic. Being on the world stage as an openly transgender woman in a role that’s traditionally been held up as the the ultimate embodiment of womanhood is damn impressive (and overdue). “It’s important that people can see you to feel that they have a positive reference,” Ponce says. “It’s important that people see women like me to know that the ideas they may have about transgender people aren’t always true.”

But Ponce isn’t interested in simply being a silent symbol. She’s taking advantage of her moment on the global stage to speak out about the issue of gender identity—specifically, the rights of transgender adults and minors to be able to define their correct gender on official forms of ID. “It’s about [fighting for] the right to be,” she says. “It would diminish bullying and prejudice and the pain that society puts on us, unintentionally, for not knowing more about being transgender.”

The thing is, these simple semantics matter. The right to be addressed and identified correctly, would have made a big difference for Ponce growing up, she says, citing the total sense of vulnerability and rejection she felt when her childhood doctor continued to refer to her by her previous (male) name.

That brings us, inevitably, to Donald Trump, whose long history with the Miss Universe pageant, and of making disparaging comments about transgender individuals, loom large over our conversation. Earlier this year, the Trump administration signaled it would attempt to roll back civil rights protections of transgender individuals under federal law—effectively erasing the estimated 1.4 million adults who identify as trans in the U.S. In Trump’s view, gender is an unchangeable fact defined by the genitalia you are born with.

Angela Ponce in white flamenco dress.

Ponce onstage representing Spain during the National Costume Show.

Amorn Pitayanant

Despite this—or likely, let’s be honest, because of it—Ponce says she’d love the chance to sit down with President Trump. “I really don’t know what might cross his mind…but I would like to have a conversation one human being to another and try to explain to him that the rights I am fighting for are simply the rights of every human being,” she says. “I would try to make him feel in his heart the importance of understanding other people. And I would try to help him understand with the position that he’s in, he could help save lives.”

In a pageant that’s already had a cringe-worthy controversy, Ponce’s platform of understanding and equality might be why some reports have her favored to win the crown. “I’m working very hard to win and I would be very proud to achieve that,” she says, “not only for my country nor for myself but for all the people whose situation in the world could change if they called my name.” With her historic role and fight to be seen, Ponce has already proved that trans people are a minority that can’t be ignored—or erased.

The Miss Universe pageant will air live December 16 at 7:00 P.M. ET on FOX.



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Ada Hegerberg Makes History, Then Is Asked If She Knows How to Twerk


While you were sleeping, a little moment riled up the sports world. It was a history-making event: Ada Hegerberg, 23, the star striker from Olympique Lyonnais team in Norway, was the first woman to ever be honored with the prestigious Ballon d’Or award, recognizing her as the best soccer player in the world. She gave a heartfelt speech about the players who would follow in her footsteps, saying, “I wanted to end with some words for young girls around the world: believe in yourselves.”

And then the host, French DJ Martin Solveig, stepped up to ask her a question. About her 157 career goals, her inspirational impact on girls everywhere, her incredible decision to boycott the sport until female players in Norway get more respect? No. He asked, in French, “Do you know how to twerk?” Hegerberg gave a terse no, and tried to exit the stage.

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The video already has hundreds of thousands of views, and appropriately, the Internet went off.

Tennis player Andy Murray shared his rage on Instagram Stories.

Actor Hugh Grant chimed in on Twitter, and others followed:

And Hegerberg’s fellow soccer players, like U.S. midfielder Lindsey Horan, gold medalist Abby Wambach, and Swedish player Sif Atladóttir chimed in too:

Bottom line is this is yet another episode that reflects exactly where feminism is at right now. Women are breaking glass ceilings. Setting new records. Yet still getting asked questions about what they’re wearing (like when Amal Clooney was in court for a major human rights case), their diet (like Scarlett Johansson fitting into her Black Widow costume; and no, Robert Downey Jr. wasn’t asked the same, or how they “balance” work and, well, the rest of life.

Solveig apologized quickly after the show, saying, “of course I didn’t want to offend anyone.” I believe him—most people don’t intend to insult women or their accomplishments. This is just so ingrained in our culture that it eventually comes out, like a Freudian slip. We have to actively think and process and combat it.

Hegerberg did what most women do in these situations. She smiled, said she wasn’t offended, shook hands, and moved on. Because she is focused on the work. Note to any future interviewers to do the same. Ask women about the training, the challenges, the joys. You know, the same questions you ask the guys.





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