Not Just for Boys: The Push to Make Girls’ Flag Football a Varsity Sport

By Ariel Doss

Reporting Texas

Concordia’s women’s flag football team prays with opposing team following a scrimmage game Monday, March 24, 2025.  Ariel Doss/Reporting Texas

Girls’ flag football is a sanctioned high school varsity sport in just 14 states, but advocates–from small high schools to the NFL–are pushing to expand it.

The legitimization of girls’ flag football by a state is able to expand participation and provide more resources to female athletes, but it might open doors for girls beyond their high school years.

“The schools that aren’t and the states that aren’t are taking away opportunities from younger girls,” Ashlea Klam, a flag football player at Keiser University and a Global Flag Ambassador for the Houston Texans, said. “I didn’t even get to participate in signing day because flag football wasn’t a sport.”

Concordia University in Austin, Texas is the first university in the state to have a women’s flag football program. Texas, one of the states not a part of the 14 that have legitimized the sport, is still just developing club teams.

“There are a lot of high schools who have it as a club right now,” said Klam. Especially in the Dallas and Houston area, but the Texans are definitely starting in the Austin market.”

Klam has been working with the Houston Texans and the NFL on making this push to get the sport sanctioned. You might have even spotted her in a Super Bowl commercial.

“The opportunities that flag football has given us, to be able to say that I’ve been in a Super Bowl commercial because of flag football,” Klam said. “Like, that’s insane to me.”

While Klam was not able to play flag football as a varsity sport at her high school, she was able to play for Texas Fury, an NFL-sanctioned select travel team. One of the directors of Texas Fury, Keenan Hughes, took the head coaching job at Concordia and has been establishing the program this year.

In 2026, Concordia’s team will reach club status, and by 2027, the team will officially be a varsity sport at the university. 

Concordia is hosting a Women’s Flag Football showcase on April 4-5 for the first-ever collegiate women’s flag football tournament.

For Klam, she is excited to see the future potential of flag football in college athletics.

“Being able to get my college paid for from the sport that I’m so passionate about, “ Klam said. “And I have been so passionate about it since a like, younger age, it’s just it’s everything to me”