The Golden Trident

By Nina Wither

Photo courtesy of Russ Lombard

This fall Golden High School welcomes its first ever girls flag football program. A new sport during the fall season may add some scheduling challenges but the new culture it will create is one Golden won’t want to miss. The program has already seen immense interest and is eager to compete. 

Flag football is becoming an increasingly popular sport and Golden has now joined the bandwagon. Creating new opportunities for students at Golden to support and show up for their friends and school. The addition of this new program at Golden will not only provide a new pocket of community but it will also give girls of all grades at Golden more opportunities to connect with their peers in a healthy fashion, outside of academics.

Girls at Golden High School have long been acquainted with pulling flags, running yards and crafting plays, as Powderpuff has been a Golden Homecoming tradition for many years. Each year junior and senior girls form teams to compete against each other in a two out of three tournament during Homecoming week. The tournament lasts for one day, with games lasting 20 minutes each. While the tradition is one girls very much look forward to every year, 20 minutes wasn’t enough. The collaboration and competitiveness of this sport has sparked interests of many girls at Golden. They wanted more; more routes, more catches, more sprints, more games, more chances, more opportunities.

 

Around 60 girls showed interest in playing flag football and around 40 are coming to try out in August. While the team is only large enough for 30, there are strong projections of growth for this team in the coming seasons. 

The program will be led by head coach Jon Warga. He has previously coached the NFL Flag Football league for 5 years. According to Warga, his teams won 101 games out of 109, including 9 tournaments. While it will be his first time as a high school coach, his keen eye for talent and dedication will lead this program. Originally, Warga wanted to focus on developing a strong set of skills among the girls over the summer and before tryouts, which are August 11th; however he says, “because of the enthusiasm and athleticism from the girls we are so far ahead of schedule.”

But as this is a first year program, it carries a few natural challenges. Warga describes that not only was it challenging to navigate building a first year program but also doing it over the summer, as girls flag football is a fall sport. It’s the art of gauging how much the team can learn in such a short amount of time. He explains that because tryouts are August 11th and the first game of the season is August 16th there is little time to put a team together without having a skeleton of a team from previous years to work with.

Girls flag football has been a relatively new addition to many schools in Jefferson County. In August of 2022, the Denver Bronco’s Charities funded a pilot program- a small-scale experiment to test for effectiveness- among Jeffco, Cherry Creek and Denver school districts. The Jefferson County schools included Arvada, Arvada West, Chatfield, Columbine, Evergreen, Lakewood, Pomona and Littleton. They all played in a jamboree in October of 2022, and had overwhelming results. 

Soon after, the board of directors at CHSAA approved girls flag football as a pilot program for the 2022-2023 school year. Then in the fall of 2024, flag football became a sanctioned sport by CHSAA for the 2024-2025 seasons. As of the 2024-2025 season, Colorado became one of 17 states around the country to have sanctioned flag football as a varsity high school sport. It quickly became a big hit, having 1,972 participants just in the first year. 

In a world where screens can often take over, making friends is becoming harder and harder, access to yet another program creates easier, and more controlled environments for students at Golden to make connections with one another. 

Ashyln Bates, a senior at Golden, says, “Obviously I hope to win…while the wins are nice, the bigger takeaway is the girls building each other up, learning new things and creating a supportive environment for everyone to play in.” Additionally when doing an activity with people it creates bonds you can’t find in other parts of your life such as school or work.

During the 2024-2025 season, Ashyln played flag football for Green Mountain High School because Golden didn’t have a team yet. She is excited to integrate her previous experience with a new passionate and excited team. “Hopefully it will spark a new interest in wanting to be involved in GHS. Not only for flag football but for all girls sports.” 

The 2024-2025 team will be holding practices two times a week, and have games throughout the week. As this is still a very new high school sport there are only two other teams in the 4A league including Evergreen High School and Green Mountain High School. However, many of Golden’s non-league games are against schools such as Bear Creek High School, Dakota Ridge High School, Lakewood High School, Littleton High School, Pomona High School, Ralston Valley High School, Steamboat Springs High School, and Wheat Ridge High School.  

More information about the team’s schedule and practices can be found on their instagram below. 

@goldenhsflag