Western’s Sydney Ford delivered her best performances when needed most
Sydney Ford was probably already going to be the Miami Herald’s Broward County Flag Football Player of the Year even before she suited up for the Class 2A championship last month in Jacksonville.
Her championshipclinching performance only added to her loaded resume.
The senior threw for 175 yards and three touchdowns, ran for 80 yards and another touchdown, and paced Western with nine flag pulls to lead the Wildcats on a 14-point comeback to beat Lithia Newsome, 34-14, and win their first-ever flag football state title.
“She literally took over the game,” coach James O’Brien said.
It wasn’t even quite an outlier performance.
As a quarterback, Ford went 307 of 423 for 3,809 yards, 50 touchdowns and just seven interceptions, and ran 47 times for 355 yards and six more touchdowns. She even caught 12 passes for 114 yards and four touchdowns.
As a linebacker, Ford led Western with 71 flag pulls and had a sack and three interceptions.
TAKING ON THE BOYS
Ford has been playing flag football since elementary school — first against boys, who didn’t appreciate her presence — and it paid off with a historic career in Davie.
“They didn’t like me at first,” the Herald’s Broward Flag Football Player of the Year said with a laugh. “They didn’t want a girl on their team.”
Ford is now a threetime, first-team All-Broward selection and the Wildcats, after going undefeated this year, lost
just one game in her last two seasons as the starting quarterback.
After Western lost by one point in the 2A championship last year, Ford
wasn’t going to go out with anything less than a title.
“Everyone was so locked in this year and every single weekend,
every single day we practiced for at least two hours,” Ford said. “From the first practice, I saw something. I was like, ‘This is our year’.”