Girls flag football has grown immensely as a worldwide sport in recent years. It was officially sanctioned by the California Interscholastic Federation, which governs statewide high school sports, in February 2023, and its upcoming appearance in the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles will put it in the international spotlight.
Despite the sport’s burgeoning popularity, plans for a team at Lynbrook this fall were unsuccessful due to insufficient enrollment. Still, plans to promote and assemble a team next season remain unchanged.
Numerous Vikings offer opinions on the possible establishment of flag football at Lynbrook in the near future.
Chris Baugh, math teacher: Hopefully, flag football could get some girls who might not have been interested in football before. Football has been predominantly a male-dominated sport, so having a girls team would be important in terms of parity and equity. The No. 1 challenge would be getting accustomed to the rules of the sport — this is brand-new across the state of California, so we’d all be kind of learning and growing together.
Noah Agishi Brown, freshman: People who are trying to seek the thrill of major sports, especially tackling, would not really find that in flag football. I think the tackle football team is good enough for now and the pros of having tackle football outweigh those of flag football.
Ziyuan Gao, freshman: I think regular tackle football is a bit better. More people join it, and no one really knows what flag football is; it kind of reminds me of an elementary school game.
Adella Jin, sophomore: Flag football is a very unique sport, and I think that this promotes a closer community with a lot of positivity and chemistry among the players. I would definitely encourage people to join flag football because it gives female athletes the opportunity to enjoy the community of the sport.
Rohin Saharoy, sophomore: Flag football is a great mechanism for people who don’t want to get hit to play a sport. It’s a great way to add female representation to a male-dominated sport and a great way to expose students to a new world of football at a high school level.
Tanush Agrawal, junior: I think one major appeal of flag football would be that there’s not a lot of contact, so there is a lower chance of injuries. I know a lot of sports have people very worried about injuries, and flag football is a good way to prevent that fear.
Kasturi Kirubaharan, senior: I’m happy I joined the normal tackle football team, but if there was an all-girls flag football team freshman year, I would have definitely joined it. It would be nice to have other girls on the tackle football team and to have someone to talk to and relate to more; being able to play among females is much easier than just co-ed. So I think it would be really great to have girls flag football.
