Where it started
The athlete the data found first.
Most of our stories start with a game. This one starts with a database. Carys McCreath had been through USA Football talent ID camps and enough combines that the earliest version of BreakAway was already full of her numbers. When we went looking at who stood out in our own data, she did. Her club, Pirate Bay Krewe, was competing in the Oakley Icon Alliance series we statted, so the game record kept agreeing with the combine record.
We featured her as our first Athlete of the Month. That could have been the end of it, one post and a handshake. Instead it became a standing relationship with the whole family: Gillie and Deena on the sideline, Carys on the field, and a running conversation about what the sport's record should look like.
What happened
Then the statting platform launched, and they just took it.
When self-serve statting went live, nobody at BreakAway onboarded the McCreaths. Gillie picked it up and started statting Carys's games on his own initiative, which means every athlete on the roster got the full record: play-by-play, box scores, stat cards after every game. During the NFL FLAG Championships, with BreakAway statting the showcase division, the family was locked in from home.
We are following along BreakAway data for all the stats, so keep them coming!
And here is how it spreads. One of Carys's teammates is a Gambino, and the Gambinos are a four-daughter flag family with kids across several teams. Gillie got Sarah Gambino statting, and now Gambino games show up in the record with nobody from BreakAway within a hundred miles of the field. One family taught the next family, bleacher to bleacher.
Where it is now
A seat at the table, not a shoutout.
The McCreaths are BreakAway's first Founding Family. And Carys got something better than a feature: she heads the BreakAway Athlete Advisory Panel, recruiting athletes like her and presenting what the panel finds to the people who build the product. Her camp numbers started the relationship. Now her opinions shape the app her sport runs on.
Why it worked
If you are a flag family, here is the part to steal.
Carys had years of combine and game data before statting was even a product. When opportunities showed up, the proof was already there. The best time to start your athlete's record is her next game.
When Gillie stats a game, every girl on the field gets a stat line, not just his daughter. You are one volunteer away from your whole team having a season on the record.
The Gambinos did not find this through an ad. A family they sat next to every weekend showed them. If you already stat, the most useful thing you can do is show one more bleacher.
No campaign built this chain. A talented athlete, two families who care, and a record that was worth passing along.