Girls push for flag football in Pasco schools
LAND O’LAKES — Sophie Spiegel is a flag football fanatic.
The Land O’Lakes High ninth grader plays on a traveling tournament team, two Sunday recreational league teams and a Friday night 7 vs 7 competitive team. She figures she’s out on the fields six days a week playing or practicing.
“I do love it,” Spiegel, 15, said before warmups on Sunday. “It’s just so much fun. … I find it a cool sport.”
So much that she and her fellow players want more. They’ve launched a campaign asking the Pasco County School Board to add flag football to its list of available high school athletic options for girls.
“A lot of (people) think football is a boys’ sport,” said Anna Quatrino, 14, an eighth grader at Lutz K-8 School who will attend Land O’Lakes High in the fall. “Girls can do anything we want. … It’s getting to the Olympics. Colleges are starting to do it. Getting it in high school in Pasco means more girls can get an opportunity.”
Parent Shawn Millard, who coaches rec teams in Pasco and a high school team in Hernando County, has helped spearhead a letter-writing effort and is working to bring dozens of supporters to the school board’s meeting on Tuesday. He said Pasco schools need to catch up with the community.
“In Hillsborough County, they’ve been playing in high school for years,” said Millard, whose daughter Ariel will attend Hudson High in the fall. “All the surrounding counties — Polk, Pinellas, Hernando — they’ve had flag football in high school for a while too.”
He noted that the Olympics have sanctioned flag football for the 2028 games, and colleges including Pasco-Hernando State College are fielding teams and offering scholarships.
According to the Florida High School Athletic Association, 343 high schools have teams, while national data show Florida had 9,066 high school players in 2023, up from 5,391 in 2014.
“It’s a sport that Pasco County has got to understand how big it is,” Millard said.
School district officials have noticed.
“It’s a very hot sport right now,” said Matt Wicks, Pasco’s athletic director, noting the NFL has put its backing behind the growth. “We want to be able to add it.”
The question boils down to whether the district can fit the expense into its budget, Wicks said. He proposed putting flag football into all high schools last year but gained no traction.
The primary costs include a coaching supplement of about $2,500 per school, uniforms and flags, referee fees and bus travel.
This year, he’s looking at a scaled back model, perhaps at half the district’s high
schools — similar to the district’s entry into lacrosse. State law allows students to play for teams at schools they don’t attend if their
own school does not offer a sport.
“If I could get it at six schools around the county, that would be ideal,” Wicks
said. “It’s all about how can we be strategic about adding it.”
School board members said they’ve been getting dozens of emails about the issue. They sounded open to the idea.
Board member Colleen Beaudoin said she had questions about the cost and the ability to start small. She planned to start making inquiries as interest rises.
“It seems like there are lots of parents wanting it,” board vice chairperson Alison Crumbley said. “If it’s good for kids, we need to look at it.”
Millard said he and other parents have been working to address any doubts, collecting information about the rising participation rates and the extent of the costs.
“Maybe it’s about $10,000 per school,” he said. “Of a $1.2 billion budget, I’m sure we could figure it out.”
Kennedy Schaer, 14, who’s been playing for just over three years, has high hopes. She’s on the team at her Hillsborough County charter school and would like to continue on a team when she begins Wesley Chapel High in the fall.
She said it would be a good way to get to know people at her new much bigger school, stay active and generate school spirit.
Having recreational and league options is one way for girls to get involved, said Allison Schaer, Kennedy’s mom. Locally, Pasco’s Pirate Bay flag league has grown from two girls’ teams playing each other on one field to where girls play Friday nights and Sunday mornings on eight fields at the Land O’Lakes Recreational Complex.
But many families can’t participate on those weekend hours, Schaer said, and “it’s leaving out a big chunk of our girls.” If the district would offer flag, she said, “I feel like they would get the buy-in.”
Spiegel, the Land O’Lakes High freshman, had no doubt.
“So many girls want to play, but they don’t have the chance,” she said. “If you made a team, it would change our school.”