GHSA’s Newest Sport Still Has Room for More
In 2018, the Atlanta Falcons launched a campaign to stir interest in flag football at the high school level in Georgia. Led by team owner Arthur Blank, the pro football franchise approached the Gwinnett County school system with the idea to begin a trial program in which the Falcons would provide the funding for schools to field teams. All 19 Gwinnett schools elected to participate, and with that, flag football in Georgia was born.
The next season, several more counties were invited to join the Falcons’ efforts to expand flag football in Georgia. One of those invitees was Muscogee County. According to Jeff Battles, Director of Athletics for the Muscogee School District, the Falcons had invited him and other Muscogee school district officials to come to Gwinnett back in 2018 to watch a game and get a bit more familiar with the sport.
“We drove up to Gwinnett County and liked what we saw,” said Battles.
Battles drove back to Columbus and presented the idea to Superintendent Dr. David Lewis, who liked the idea.
“He signed off on it, and I then met with the athletic directors, and we began to put together our plan,” said Battles.
The one thing that was important to Battles was that all eight schools bought into the idea of having a flag football team.
“It was important that we were all in,” Battles said.
The Muscogee school district consists of Columbus High, Shaw, Jordan, Northside-Columbus, Hardaway, Spencer, Kendrick, and Carver-Columbus.
“I didn’t want some of our schools to do it, and then some not do it,” said Battles.
According to Battles, there was some skepticism to begin with. No one knew whether students would be interested. The schools had interest meetings with their students to find out if there was enough interest in making the approach to flag football worth it.
“The interest was huge,” Battles said.
The interest and enthusiasm were not limited to the Muscogee district, either – a total of 56 teams made up the 2019 season of flag football statewide.
“We actually had a couple of schools that had to cut players because there [were] so many girls wanting to play,” Battles said.
The idea of starting a flag football program attracted Battles since it gave girls another opportunity to play a sport that they liked, especially if they didn’t like other sports.
“For a lot of our female students, this is the only sport they play because they either don’t care for the other sports we offer, for whatever reason, and to me that’s one of the things I really like about the flag football program; it gives more of our kids another option,” Battles said.
Once the schools had a good response and knew they would have enough students to make a team, the next step was to find coaches.
At Columbus High, Chris Gaines was a natural fit to coach the Lady Blue Devils flag football squad. He is currently the wide receivers coach for the Blue Devils football team and also played flag football in college, at nearby Columbus State, where his team competed in four flag football state tournaments and actually won the state championship in one of those seasons, defeating the University of Georgia’s flag football entry.
“Flag football had been a big part of my life, so I was really excited when I found out that we were going to have a flag football team across the entire school district, and especially here at Columbus High School, where I teach and coach,” Gaines said. “So, I jumped at the opportunity.”
Once tryouts were announced, Gaines said the response was overwhelming.
“We had about 70 girls come out,” said Gaines. “It was nuts. It was just me and one assistant coach, John Randall Lasseter, who is on the staff of the Blue Devils team with me.”
The large turnout was great, but the problem was that he was told he could have only 18 players on the roster.
“It was very hard to let so many of the girls go, but at the same time, it was great to see so much enthusiasm,” said Gaines.
There was one important part in deciding who would make the cut for team.
“Well, they had to be able to pull the flag,” Gaines said.
Armed with the first-ever Columbus High flag football team, Gaines, his assistant coach, and his group of players began practicing.
“We had two and a half weeks of practice before our first game,” Gaines said.
Gaines’s team consisted of seven starters on offense, and seven on defense, with four reserves. His offense ran the triple option, with a center, a quarterback, three receivers and two running backs.
“We played seven regular season games [against the other seven district teams], and then we had a county tournament,” Gaines said.
In that tournament, the top four teams with the best regular season record played each other to decide the Muscogee County champion.
Columbus played Shaw in the championship game, with Gaines’ Columbus team winning 27-0. They say defense wins championships, and Gaines’s team did just that. They did not allow a single point in their seven regular season games or the two county tournament games.
From there, Columbus went on to play in the state tournament, which included the top teams from the other counties. The Columbus girls won all three state playoff games, including the state championship game, and played under the big top at Mercedes Benz Stadium.
In the title game, it was the Columbus defense coming up big once again with a 31-0 shutout over the Collins Hill team. Gaines was understandably elated.
“We were a 4A school, playing in a state tournament with Class A through 7A schools, so I was proud of these girls,” said Gaines. “The whole season was so much fun.”
With the initial 2018 pilot season of Gwinnett County schools in the books, along with the 2019 season involving Gwinnett, Muscogee, and four other counties represented, the GHSA decided it was time to take a serious look at making flag football an association-sanctioned sport.
According to GHSA Associate Director Ernie Yarbrough, after those first two seasons of success, the GHSA would move toward making flag football in Georgia a championship-sanctioned event.
“The Falcons approached us about it after seeing the initial success, and Dr. [Robin] Hines, GHSA Executive Director, asked me to oversee the project,” said Yarbrough. “We then took the proposal to our Board of Trustees, who voted unanimously to make flag football a GHSA Championship event, and it has just taken off from there.”
There are currently 227 schools now participating statewide in flag football, but Yarbrough hopes that number will increase as the sport grows in popularity.
“We had a goal of 250 teams for this year, so we came close,” Yarbrough said.
Yarbrough is hoping the game will catch on in the southern part of the state, and more teams can come from schools south of middle Georgia.
“Right now, we have no teams below Houston County that are playing flag football, so we hope that will change moving forward,” said Yarbrough.
If your school is interested in starting a flag football team, contact the GHSA’s Ernie Yarbrough at 706-647-7473 ext. 27.
