BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) — It's a sport you've probably never heard of.
Futsal is a sport popular among South American countries and is described as an indoor-like soccer game with some basketball components. Here in the United States, there's a select few who've excelled in the sport and that includes 17-year-old twins Camryn and Marisa Warren. The recent Nichols School graduates were standout athletes in high school and played soccer, basketball, and lacrosse among others. Using skills from all of those sports, they gave futsal a try.
"Just having different sports, we were able to be more athletic and be able to understand different aspects of the game," Marisa said. "We were then able to apply it to different sports."
The Warren sisters became pretty good at futsal and began training with the Heart and Sole Futsal Academy in Ohio. Together, they decided to try out for the sport's U.S. Youth National team.
"You're competing against each other but also you want to both make it," Marisa said. "It's also a little nerve-wracking because futsal isn't as popular in Buffalo so we didn't know how we stacked up against the competition."
The Warrens were two of more than 5,000 boys and girls nationwide who tried out and earlier this month, the sisters learned they were two of twelve their age to make the team. The twins will be apart of the 2001 girls age division and will compete in three international matches down in Argentina.
"The odds weren't necessarily with us," Camryn said. "So we're really excited we get to do this."
"In Argentina, the men's futsal National team just won the Futsal World Cup," Marisa added. "So they know futsal and definitely have a really good culture there so it's gonna be exciting to play against the best."
It's an amazing opportunity, not just to compete alongside extremely talented players but to represent Western New York in a sport most don't know much about.
"We've been working our whole lives to be able to do something this great," Camryn said. "It's just been an awesome experience for us to do that."
