Flag football in the Olympics? After a festival in Charlotte, the sport has momentum

Madison Fulford sprinted toward the deep right corner of the end zone, the yellow flags hanging off her hips, billowing in the wind behind her. Turning her head, the Charlotte native looked up to see a perfectly placed pass headed her way.

In a backward leap that rivaled Odell Beckham Jr.’s famous one-handed grab, Fulford levitated and pulled the ball in.

Touchdown, U.S.A.

With her fourth — yes, fourth — touchdown in fewer than 40 minutes, Fulford put the U.S. up 26-21 over Mexico with fewer than two minutes remaining. It was up to the defense to seal it.

Amber Clark, from nearby Greenville, N.C., answered the call. The safety pulled in an interception with 1:36 remaining and locked up the gold medal for the U.S. in the International Federation of American Football’s Americas Continental Championship.

Hardware aside, what stood out to many players was the number of kids, teenagers and adults converging around the field to experience what flag football has to offer — a testament to the game’s growth in the U.S. and around the world.

“I hope it grows the most that it can. I hope that I see it in the NCAA. I hope I see it in the Olympics. I hope I see a professional league. I just want to see this thing grow,” Clark said. “I love this game. I die for this game, I cry for this game, I live for this game.”

International flavor in Charlotte

The 2023 IFAF Americas Continental Championships welcomed teams from seven countries to fight for the title of North American flag football champion from July 5-7 at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. The men’s and women’s gold medal games each featured the U.S. against Mexico — both American squads emerged victorious, the men winning 40-36, and the women by a 26-21 margin.

Held in conjunction with the IFAF Americas Championship, USA Football hosted the Junior Flag International Cup, a competition between boys’ and girls’ 15U and 17U international teams, as well as The One, a national championship event featuring club teams from across the U.S. from ages 6U to adult.

In collaboration USA Football, the Carolina Panthers also hosted the Carolina Blitz on Saturday, including a Fan Fest area, youth football activities and appearances from Panthers legend Mike Rucker and mascot Sir Purr.

By bringing together elite international competition as well as the country’s best club programs, events like this are helping to raise awareness of the sport for men and women everywhere, in every stage of life.

“It’s very special, what you’re seeing in flag right now, where you have the growth of the sport at the grassroots and also the growth of the sport at the elite,” said Eric Mayes, USA Football managing director of high performance and national teams. “We have an opportunity to take both of those and converge them together.”

Opening doors

The rising popularity of flag football has opened a door many girls and women didn’t know existed. Seven states have varsity girls’ leagues, with scholarship opportunities at the collegiate level beginning to appear.

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools Athletics, with the help of the Carolina Panthers, completed its second district-wide season of girls’ varsity flag football in May, with 24 teams from 19 schools participating. Several other NFL teams have a hand in building flag football’s profile in their own communities.

Safety concerns surrounding tackle football have also caused a migration toward flag football for youth. A study by the CDC published in Sports Health revealed from ages 6 to 14, athletes playing tackle football experience 15 times more head impacts than those playing flag.

Increasingly, parents are placing their children, both boys and girls, in flag football until the high school level. The SFIA found that from 2020 to 2021, tackle football participation for ages 6 to 12 declined nearly 18 percent. Flag football participation over that period, however, was growing.

USA Football has the unique opportunity, because of the newness of the sport at an official level, to establish a developmental framework that sets a high standard for flag football worldwide. This Football Development Model is used with both genders in mind, setting it apart from conventional tackle football.

“As far as we’re concerned, we’re agnostic,” USA Football CEO and IFAF Board vice president Scott Hallenbeck said. “Tell us where you want to play, and we’re here to support you with a framework of standards and best practices …whether you want to be on the girls to women side or the boys to men side, we have resources that can support you.”

Going global

The Football Development Model supports long-term athlete development by providing entry points and options for everyone who wishes to play the sport of football, including limited contact and tackle football. This framework is meant to draw in youth and adult athletes to create a sustainable foundation for the sport to grow locally and globally.

While programs like the USA Football Men’s and Women’s Flag National Teams are ambassadors for flag football worldwide, international events helped fuel the sport’s global rise, Hallenbeck said.

The window between the 2018 and 2021 IFAF World Championships, in Panama and Israel, respectively, saw the number of teams and countries double. It was between 2020 and 2022 that Olympic discussions took flight.

“We’re also seeing that internationally you have young boys and girls that follow what’s going on in the United States and have makeshift jerseys of our athletes on their wall,” Mayes said. “That’s not something you would anticipate from the sport three, four years ago. It shows that our athletes or teams are beginning to create an audience for themselves.”

The USA Football Flag National Teams’ players are also global spokespeople promoting the growth of the sport. USA Football has athlete ambassadors who travel the country and raise awareness of the sport. Some even host their own camps or coach their own teams.

U.S. Women’s National Team captain and quarterback Vanita Krouch is an ambassador who’s often at the forefront, acting as the representative for the team and flag football itself.

“I feel like I’m living a dream. And I constantly tell people, don’t even pinch me, just let me keep sleeping,” Krouch told the NFL Network. “I feel honored to be a part of it, to compete in it. It’s growing so fast, the competition globally, all the different countries entering and playing.”

The challenge now for organizers is to solidify flag football’s global reputation as a sport to be taken seriously, from the youth level through the elite. Continental and international events like those in Charlotte help with visibility.

The 2022 World Games were held in Birmingham, Alabama, and for the first time, flag football was included. Not only did this add another major official competition to the sport’s resume, it put it on “a multi-sport international stage.”

The U.S. Men’s Flag Football National Team came away from that event with a gold medal, and the Women’s Flag Football National Team grabbed silver after falling to Mexico in the championship.

The NFL’s Pro Bowl also recently shifted to a flag football model, abandoning the traditional tackle football competition for the first time ever.

The IFAF World Championship — of which the U.S. Men are five-time champions and the U.S. Women have claimed back-to-back titles — occurs every two years, bringing the world’s elite teams to one stage. The IFAF World Cup does the same, every four years.

Flag football in the Olympics?

Awareness is key for flag football executives, who are continuing to push for the sport’s inclusion in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

Flag football is one of nine sports under consideration, and the International Olympic Committee is set to make its final decision in October.

“If you add the opportunity to, in a four-and-a-half short years, be in the Olympics …” Hallenbeck said. “I don’t think we’ll see anything like the expansive and rapid growth of the sport and the quality of athletes and passion around it will just continue to grow.”

The growth of the sport has been one of the most encouraging signs pointing toward international recognition. According to a 2022 study done by the Sports and Fitness Industry Association (SFIA), 7.1 million people in the U.S. participated in flag football, with 2.5 million engaging regularly with the sport.

Globally, that number is close to 20 million participants in more than 100 countries.

Flag football outperforms tackle football among U.S. youth, too. According to the SFIA, in 2021 there were 1.6 million more kids playing flag football than tackle, with the numbers trending toward an even wider disparity.

The Continental Championships in Charlotte were a critical event for both U.S. Flag Football National Teams — it’s a qualifying pathway for the 2024 IFAF Flag Football World Championships in Lahti, Finland, another event that’s important in the sport’s Olympic quest.

Doing well in these international competitions, especially those that are multi-sport, works to push flag football into the spotlight where the IOC can see the impact it has made in the U.S. and around the world.

“We refer to it as a train going 150 miles an hour down the track. It’s super impressive how fast it’s growing, particularly on the girls’ and women’s side,” Hallenbeck said. “It’s just incredible. I’ve never seen anything like it.”