Girls Flag Football To Be Recognized as a Sport

by LEXI FRIESEL

In order to move towards its Title IX goal of achieving gender equality in athletics, the Northern Section of the California Interscholastic Federation will vote on recognizing girls flag football as an official California high school sport. If approved this February, it will be up to individual schools to decide whether or not to introduce a program at their respective institutions.

According to the Mid Peninsula Post, the push to create football programs for girls started in the Southern CIF Section, which oversees high school athletics in Southern California. After a successful test run by schools, the CIF Southern Section officially decided to recognize girls flag football as a sport.

In terms of a potential high school program being introduced at Menlo, the sport would need to be approved by both the CIF and the Central Coast Section. “The CCS Board of Managers met on Jan. 25, 2023 and approved adding the sport, but did not determine what season it would be played in,” Menlo School Athletic Director Earl Koberlein said.

According to Koberlein, several factors must be considered in order to hypothetically introduce a girls flag football program at the school. The distribution of field space, budget and coaches are crucial to the success of beginning a program. “In the fall, we would have to identify additional football coaches because coaches who are working with the boys football program would not have time to coach both boys and girls,” Koberlein said. “In the winter, you have weather issues and soccer.”

Additionally, Koberlein emphasized the importance of student interest in the program. “If it were to be a spring sport, the program might [heavily] compete with lacrosse for athletes.”

If there are not enough girls interested in playing, the school wouldn’t be able to add a program. “I have no idea if there’s 50 girls in the school who would want to participate or only one,” Koberlein said. “People are always asking if we can add other CCS sports [such as] boys volleyball, softball, squash and rowing, but we usually cannot because there are only a few students interested.”

At this time, Koberlein emphasized that there have been no concrete decisions regarding the sport in the CCS or

Northern Section of the CIF.

Menlo has had a short unofficial flag football season for interested eighth grade girls in the spring, in which they have the opportunity to scrimmage local schools such as Sacred Heart Prep. “We’ve had a middle school girls’ flag football program for around 20 years in the spring,” Middle School Athletic Director Joe McDonald said. “The Central Coast Section is meeting to see if they will approve girls high school flag football. Menlo School will need to look at all the factors involved in approving girls flag football. Season of play, field availability, coaching and other variables need to be considered before Menlo can implement the girls flag football program.”