By Robert McKinney, Assistant Athletics Director, Communications

SALEM, Ore. -- When Willamette University's football team opens the season on Saturday, Sept. 14 at the University of La Verne in Southern California, both teams will have a first-year female kicker. It is believed to be the first time that two college teams will have a female kicker in the same game. Kickoff is at 12 p.m. (PDT).

Willamette's kicker, Kyla Gordon from West Salem High School, will be handling kickoffs, extra points and field goals for the Bearcats. It is unknown as to how much the La Verne's Mika Makekau, from Ewa Beach, Hawaii, will be involved. Makekau kicked a 30-yard field goal late in La Verne's 50-24 season-opening loss to 11th-ranked Whitworth University last weekend.

"You can either do it or you can't, and she can do it," Willamette Head Coach Isaac Parker said about Gordon's ability to kick extra points and field goals. "I first met Kyla at a Lewis & Clark camp last summer (where Parker was an assistant coach), and I was pretty impressed with her back then. My daughter is two years old, and she literally grabs the remote and asks for football. As a father of a young girl who loves football, you're more aware of it and thoughtful about the opportunities to give women in the sport."

The Bearcats have a history of supporting women in football. In 1997, Liz Heaston (Thompson) was the first woman to both play and score in a college football game when she went 2 for 2 on extra points against Linfield College. The past two years, starting late in the 2017 season, KayLyn Stirton kicked for Willamette and scored 11 points including one field goal.

Gordon, this year's kicker, is the first female kicker recruited to Willamette specifically for football. Liz Heaston and KayLyn Stirton were both originally recruited as members of the women's soccer team.