Football has come to Whitman. Not the Friday night lights of tackle football that has existed at Whitman for decades, but a new type of football that, while not quite as ubiquitous as its sibling sport, is gaining popularity across the country and the globe: flag football. The International Olympic Committee recently announced that the sport would be on the Olympic slate for 2028 in Los Angeles. Throughout the nation, more schools and states are launching the sport every year, part of a trend that has raised youth participation in flag football by 63% since 2019.
Last year, Montgomery County joined the movement by partnering with Under Armour and the Baltimore Ravens to pilot a flag football program. The initiative included all 25 MCPS high schools and was set to finish with a county tournament where the winner would advance to a state tournament at the Ravens’ stadium.
The inaugural Vikings flag football team went 5-3 in the regular season, outscoring opponents by 79 points. The Vikings finished with a deep playoff run that ended in a defeat in the county semifinals.
Whitman flag football coach Shawn Winans is a lifelong football fan who volunteered to coach the flag football team when it was formed in 2024.
“It’s definitely the most fun I’ve ever had coaching,” Winans said. “The program is only improving from here.”
Whitman lost 12 seniors last year, many of whom made all-county first, second or third teams. However, students of all grades signed up to play in the 2025 season, leading to a small boost in numbers for the team.
That helped Whitman put up the better of their two seasons in the second year. Whitman went 6-4 in the regular season, with a 5-1 record against teams in the region. They booked a spot as the fourth seed in the playoffs, earning a bye through the first round of the regional tournament and a matchup with Einstein at home in the second round. In front of the home crowd, the Vikings moved on, convincingly beating the Titans 42-0. In the regional semifinals, the flag football team beat QO 19-6, and then an hour after the end of that game, they took down BCC 34-12 to advance to the state tournament.
The Vikings stayed at the fourth seed in the state tournament when they travelled to M&T Bank Stadium on Nov. 7. There, they defeated Wise High School 14-6 to advance to the state finals. The run came to an end, just short of a trophy, when the Vikings lost to Clarksburg 19-0, earning second place out of the 46 teams in the 4A/3A classification.
Playing at M&T Bank was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for senior wide receiver and defensive back Dylan Schwartz.
“I never thought in a million years I’d get to play a sport that I love in a stadium where professional athletes play,” Schwartz said. “We ran out of their tunnel and I felt like we were on top of the world.”
The addition of flag football to the Whitman sports roster has also given more opportunities for girls to play sports at Whitman. According to linebacker Anya Campbell, who’s been on the team for both of its two years, flag football gives girls the ability to play a sport that many of them were already fans of.
“It’s really empowering for girls,” Campbell said. “Often, football is seen as a guy sport, so I think it’s important that there’s more representation for women in sports.”
Although flag football shares a premise and some rules with tackle football, there are differences between the two versions. Both sports share four downs, touchdowns and extra points. However, the method of downing a player is different: pulling a flag rather than tackling. The field is also shorter in flag football at 80 yards instead of 100. Flag football has two halves of 24 minutes as opposed to tackle football’s four quarters of 12 minutes. Instead of starting every first down with 10 yards to go, flag football teams can get first downs at midfield and each 20-yard line, meaning they can start a first down with anywhere from 1 to 20 yards to go. Instead of kicking a point after touchdown, teams can go for one point from the 2-yard line and two extra points from the 5-yard line.
Coach Winans said the differences between flag and tackle football are mostly a good thing, differentiating the sports from each other.
“I don’t think flag football is going to turn into tackle football,” Winans said. “It’s going to stay as its own sport, and that’s a good thing.”
There are also no field goals, kickoffs or punts in flag football. Where a team would punt or perform a kickoff in tackle football, flag football players declare a punt and give the ball to the other team to start their drive at their own 14-yard line.
That rule is slightly more controversial among flag football players and coaches. Although Winans supports the difference between games, Schwartz and Campbell said the lack of kicking is one of the only thing they’d change about the current rules.
“There should be field goals just because so many of our games are low scoring,” Schwartz said. “[Kicking] would add a lot to the sport and a whole new position, too.”
As for the future of flag football, the sport’s growth doesn’t appear to be stopping, both at Whitman and across the nation. In the local community, Flag Star football has emerged to offer flag football opportunities to boys and girls from kindergarten to 12th grade. Koa Sports also recently established its own flag football program. Winans said those opportunities would help build a pipeline of talent going into high school, the same way that other sports have recreational and travel teams for students who will eventually play for their high school’s varsity team. Although Whitman doesn’t yet have a junior varsity team, Winans said he’s hoping they will get one in the next five years.
Players and coaches are hoping that the new programs and recruiting methods will bring other people the joy that current players have found in the sport.
“Flag is a super fun sport,” Schwartz said. “You don’t need to be from any sort of sports background or football background to get involved.”
