There is a new sport in high schools in Rhode Island this upcoming school year: girls flag football. The Rhode Island Interscholastic League approved a petition to create girls flag football as a sanctioned sport. Johnston Senior High School is one of the schools that is fielding a team this inaugural season.
Ocean State Media morning host Luis Hernandez spoke with Johnston High school athletic director Justin Erickson and student athlete Bella Nunes about the upcoming flag football season.
Interview highlights
On flag football being a sanctioned sport in Rhode Island
Justin Erickson: I feel like Steve Young after he won the Super Bowl saying, "Get that monkey off my back." You know, it's been the last four years worth of work finally accomplished, and it's good for the girls.
We're going to try and move the games to be (on) Saturday and Sunday, that way it doesn't interfere with any other sport. We want multiple-sport athletes to, kind of, thrive on their island. So Bella's a cheerleader and you never would expect cheerleaders to play flag football. And you also see a lot of girls that don't even participate in phys ed class (who) get to go to flag football, which is nice to see because now they're getting out there and doing some activities.
On the opportunity to play flag football
Bella Nunes: When it first started two years ago in Johnston everyone was like, "Oh, you can't play football. Girls don't know how to play football.” They just thought it was going to be some sort of a joke. But when we would show up to practice, we took it very seriously and we put all of our work in and our program just progressed from there and now everyone respects it.
On the competitive nature of flag football
Nunes: For flag football being a no-contact sport, it gets pretty physical, and I feel like no one really notices that until you see how many flags end up getting thrown. Most of the time girls are willing to do whatever it takes literally just to get the flag, and some people, kind of, like to be physical to show like, “Hey, even though we're girls, we don't care if we're getting hit without pads on.”
When you watch regular football, you're seeing all of them get hit but they all have the protection, the padding. In flag football, we have absolutely nothing except possibly a head gear. So if you get hit in the arm or hit in the shoulder or you trip over and like someone trips you and you're rolling on the ground, it's literally just you just tumbling everywhere. At the end of the day, no no-contact sport is ever actually no contact. Every sport you play, it's going to get physical no matter what.
On the growth of flag football
Nunes: As of right now, it's one of the top 10 growing girls sports in the country, which is absolutely amazing because we love the attention that it's getting, and hopefully soon we'll get some professional leagues. Again, the idea of girls playing football has never really been popular around our area, so it's just really great getting to show our school pride while playing this sport that we all grew to love and proving that, like, "Hey, women can do it too. It's not only men that can do this." Like, we're the same exact kind of athletes as them, and sometimes, if not, better.
