Abbi Stransky comes across as quiet. Her mom describes her as shy.

But put her in shoulder pads and a football helmet, and she is a natural leader.

The Highland High School freshman has shown that leadership as quarterback of the junior varsity team.

“She’s kind of quiet and leads by example,” Coach Cory Quail said. “Her going out there at quarterback -- quiet, calm and confident … She goes out there confident, and the guys play confident because of that.”

Stransky has led her team to a 2-0 record including a pair of rushing scores and a passing touchdown.

The hardest part of playing football for Abbi was convincing her mom, Lacey, to let her play. Abbi was persistent in asking when she began middle school.

“She had been asking for a few years if she could play football,” Lacey recalled. “I kept telling her no, and I thought we had decided she was going to do cross country.”

The night before the first cross country practice, Abbi asked again about football. Lacey told her that if she asked the coach and he was OK with Abbi playing, then she could play.

“Well, she’s very shy, and I didn’t think she would do it,” Lacey said. “I went the next day to pick her up from cross country, and she came out with football cleats and a helmet.”

At that point, Lacey said she could not say no after Abbi went out of her comfort zone and talked to the coach.

“I was very surprised, but she had a big grin on her face walking to my car with the helmet and cleats,” Lacey Stransky said. 

Abbi had called a classmate and arranged to get his old cleats for practice and the next day talked with middle school coach Mitch Huntington. 

“There was no butting heads with the team at all, they definitely welcomed her in,” dad Jake Stransky said. “They were more than happy to let her do what she wanted to do.”

Abbi joins a small number of girls playing tackle football. At Iowa high schools that play 11-player football, around 35 girls have played football each year over the last five years according to the National Federation of High School Associations participation surveys. She’s one of around 2,400 girls playing football nationwide. 

Football is the most popular sport for boys in Iowa, with 16,000 suiting up for 266 different schools in the 2018-2019 season. Not only is Abbi a statistical rarity when it comes to playing at all, but she’s suiting up at quarterback rather than kicker, which is where many girls play. 

Abbi’s love for football began during recess on the elementary school playground. Tossing around the football with her friends and classmates made her want to take the next step in the sport when it was available. 

“I just really liked (football) and decided to try it out, like the real thing,” Abbi said. 

Abbi is a multi-sport athlete — playing football in the fall, basketball in the winter and softball in the summer. This past summer she stepped into a starting role for the varsity softball team in the outfield. 

Now three years after starting her tackle football career, she has turned that determination into becoming an integral part of the Highland High School football team as the junior varsity quarterback. 

It wasn’t surprising to anyone to see her take on the role of quarterback on the football field. While her mom said she has some shyness outside of sports, she opens up on the field, partially because it is what is required of her.

Abbi enjoys taking on high-pressure positions, playing point guard in basketball, quarterback in football and catcher in softball, her mom said. All of those positions require players to be comfortable playing the leader for the team. 

Her leadership on the field for the Huskies was on display in a 22-20 victory over Cardinal on Sept. 16 that went down to the wire. The first play from scrimmage saw the 5-foot-4, 115-pound quarterback get under center and push forward on a quarterback sneak for 5 yards, it was the first of many rushes for Stransky that evening as the Huskies turned to her in short-yardage situations. 

She threw for one touchdown on the night, placing the ball perfectly for Trevor McFarland to pluck out of the air over a shorter Cardinal defender. A few other deep throws were right on the money but either dropped or well defended.

A week earlier, Abbi scored her first high school touchdown against Columbus, a quarterback sneak on the goal line.

“I got up and everybody was cheering,” she recalled. “I was excited and just really thought it was a cool feeling to be a girl playing football, scoring a touchdown.”

Her coach likes what he sees in Abbi’s skills.

“Playing football isn’t an easy sport. She has that intrinsic ability to go beyond and push herself,” Highland football assistant Cory Quail said. “She’s not scared and comes out quietly confident about herself.”

Quail is new to the Highland school district this year, and from the first football practice he said he was impressed with Abbi’s ability to toss a football. 

“She has such natural skill; you watch her spin a football, and it’s impressive,” he said. 

More important than her skill at quarterback has been her attitude. During the game against Cardinal last week, when another football player came to the sideline out of breath or nicked up, Abbi was eager to fill in at outside linebacker, throwing herself into the mix on defense. 

During the week at practice she serves as the varsity scout-team quarterback, working to get the first-team defense ready for the week’s opponent. That has required taking on the different concepts other teams run and working to improve her own skills. 

“She’s someone that when you talk to her and give her advice she just takes it and picks it up,” Quail said. 

The freshman is the oldest of five with three sisters and a brother. Abbi has already inspired one of her sisters to play football. Emmerson, a fifth-grader, is playing flag football this year, and Lacey Stransky said she is absolutely inspired by Abbi playing. 

Abbi said she wants to play all four years of high school football and knows that will mean navigating the challenges of being a girl playing football. 

“I’d like to go as far as I can with it. I was told the guys will grow a lot more than I will and that I’m going to be the underdog,” she said. 

To those who say a girl shouldn’t be playing tackle football or suiting up as the quarterback? 

“I can try and prove them wrong and work hard everyday.”

Her teammates see Abbi as just another player.

“People underestimate her, but she showed off what she can do tonight,” said Brenton Bonebrake, a running back who often takes handoffs and pitches from Abbi.

“I don’t look at it as a unique thing,” coach Quail said.

“We just have a great football player whose name is Abbi,” he said. “The special thing she brings is that we don’t have to separate her; we don’t have to make her a highlight or anything like that.

“It has been great for everyone to have her around.”