Incirlik's first Thanksgiving flag football game

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Tiffany Colburn
  • 39th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
INCIRLIK AIR BASE, Turkey --  Team Incirlik celebrated the kickoff to the holiday season with a Thanksgiving Flag Football game Nov. 23, at the football field where the top five players of each squadron from the intramural football season competed.

Tony Mason, 39th Services Squadron fitness director, came up with the idea for the game and Senior Airman Byron Brown, 39th SVS sports director, and Staff Sgt. Russell Gray, 39th SVS assistant noncommissioned officer in charge of sports and fitness, helped put it together.

"A few years ago the base used to have Thanksgiving football games," said Mr. Mason. "We decided to bring it back this year because it gives us an opportunity to highlight our local football players and recognize the best of the best," he said.

First sergeants Master Sgt. William Peoples, 39th Security Forces Squadron, and Master Sergeant Sean McKinney, 39th Medical Group, coached the game after taking their teams to the top two slots during the intramural football season.

In order to allow the squadrons to have equal representation for the game, only five members from each team were allowed to participate.

The squadron coaches from the intramural season picked members from their team, said Airman Brown. The coaches for the Thanksgiving game then picked names out of a hat to see which players would be on each team. The combined teams were renamed the Pilgrims and the Indians.

We wanted each team to have 11 defensive and 11 offensive players with two alternates, but we left it up to the coaches, said Airman Brown. They were able to switch the players on their team from offense to defense.

Though there wasn't a prize for the winners, bragging rights were more than enough for the two competing teams.

"This game was a great way to boost morale," said Airman Brown. "It was something different that we haven't done before. It was also a great way to keep everyone active."

Although the final score of the game was Indians ¬- 49 and Pilgrims -13, it was all in fun and the score didn't matter. It was about getting a group of people together to get involved, said Sergeant Peoples.