Well, Taylor Timko — now 17 and a junior at Pontiac Notre Dame Prep — hasn’t made it to the NFL as a player, but when she appeared wearing No. 5 for the Fighting Irish for the Prep Bowl, she became the first female football player to play at Ford Field, the home of the NFL’s Detroit Lions.
At the same time, she made history in CHSL football as a female member of the all-boys squad handling kicking duties for field goals, extra points and kickoffs.
Notre Dame football coach Kyle Zimmerman first noticed Taylor’s explosive left leg in freshmen gym class, and asked her to think about football.
“We were just joking around,” Taylor said, but it all turned serious in August when Zimmerman offered her a spot on the team.
“My mom was a little bit unsure, but my dad was all for it — if I wanted to do it,” Taylor said. “It would be a new skill.”
Taylor’s other formidable skills in track and soccer earned her all-state laurels as a sophomore.
She was put to the test in the season opener against Almont, splitting the uprights from 35 yards out in the closing minutes to win the game for the Irish. She also converted two extra points in the 17-14 victory, the first of eight straight wins for the Irish and extending the streak of 21 consecutive regular season conquests.
“I was so nervous,” she said. “But I just stayed focused.”
Taylor has been well accepted by her male teammates. “She’s a part of the program,” Zimmerman said. However, he said, the boys became very protective of her when, in a mid-season game, she was the victim of a roughing the kicker penalty.
“What was his number?” they wanted to know. “We’ll take care of him.”
Taylor, listed at 5-foot-7 and 125 pounds, admits to getting “a little banged up” during the course of the season. Her concern is getting an injury that would affect her soccer playing.
Taylor has played soccer since second grade. She’s been on a travel team for the past eight years, and the headliner of Notre Dame’s squad, for whom she has scored 51 goals the last two years, leading the Irish to its first regional title in 15 years and to the Division 3 semifinals.
In March, she committed to play soccer at the University of Michigan. “There were about five schools I was seriously looking at, but Ann Arbor is nearby and, besides, a degree from U-M. That’s not too bad.”
In track, Taylor runs the 400- and 200-meter races and relays.
Taylor’s life revolves around “practices, studies (she maintains a 3.9 GPA) and sleep.”
The Rochester Hills-based Vardar Soccer Club takes up summer, fall and winter, creating a conflict with football. “I practice two to three times a week (in) soccer and two to three times a week (in) football,” Taylor said.
Soccer involves a lot of travel. Despite playing at far-away sites such as Arizona, Wisconsin and Illinois this fall, she’s managed to show up for her kicking duties with the Irish. “I made it back from Arizona for the homecoming game,” she said. But she missed all the fun of the Irish’s state playoff opening round 41-20 thrashing of Livonia Clarenceville because she was playing soccer in St. Louis.
In the spring, she practices primarily with the soccer team. “I show up to run” for track meets. This created a situation in May when, on the same day, soccer had a district game against Detroit Country Day in Pontiac and the track team was in Grand Rapids for the Division 2 finals.
Not to worry. Taylor scored the winning goal five minutes into overtime and then hustled down Interstate 96 across the state in time to run the anchor of the 1600-meter relay for third place.
Informed that elementary-age girls regard her as their role model, Taylor opined: “I think that anybody should be able to do whatever they set their mind to.”
Don Horkey is a freelance writer from Shelby Township.
