TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW) – State athletic officials have approved a couple of major changes to high school sports in Kansas.<\/p>\n
The Kansas State High School Activities Association held its Spring Meeting on Thursday. On the docket was a vote to sanction Girls Flag Football as a high school sport.<\/p>\n
The effort was approved \u201cto include Flag Football as a KSHSAA activity beginning with the 2026-27 school year.\u201d This had a large push behind it, including support from the Kansas City Chiefs. The decision passed on a nearly unanimous vote. <\/p>\n
Only one person out of the 62 voters voted against it. It was followed by a lot of celebration and cheering. <\/p>\n
Dozens of young women, coaches and flag football players shared their testimonies. Osawatomie Sophomore Isabel Broce was one of the students who shared her why. <\/p>\n
\u201cDoing this today means that we can get these girls to play in such a big level,\u201d Broce said. <\/p>\n
For Broce, being at the meeting goes beyond wanting to play flag football herself. <\/p>\n
\u201cNoticing that there\u2019s so many girls who also want to talk about this, it\u2019s amazing,\u201d Broce said. \u201cThe little girls who also want to play flag can. It\u2019s not let us play, it\u2019s they can play.\u201d <\/p>\n
Another reason for the push: the 2028 L.A. Olympics will have women\u2019s flag football, and professional teams are popping up all over the country. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m a dad of a daughter who has been around football her entire life,\u201d Weston Moody, Wamego High School football coach, said. \u201cShe\u2019s always asked, you know, \u2018why, why are girls not playing football,\u2019 and now I get to say, \u2018hey, there\u2019s a chance for you, you get a chance to run out on the field and play football.\u201d <\/p>\n
The Kansas City Chiefs have been big supporters, believing that football isn\u2019t just for men. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest conversation we\u2019ve been having is allowing for all fans to participate in the game of football,\u201d Lara Kroug, Chief Marketing Officer for the KC Chiefs, said. \u201cAnd by having a sanctioned sport for young women, it really unlocks opportunity. It unlocks scholarship opportunity, it gives a pathway.\u201d <\/p>\n
Incoming Ottawa University women\u2019s flag football head coach Abby Brown said she\u2019s been working towards this for five years, but the work doesn\u2019t end here. <\/p>\n
\u201cJust continue supporting these girls and providing opportunities for them,\u201d Brown said. <\/p>\n
Kansas is the 18th state to sanction girls flag football at the high school level. <\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 WIBW. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW) – State athletic officials have approved a couple of major changes to high school sports…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":873271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2026],"tags":[4530,7,117604,5538,79111,8389,26438,9,4655],"class_list":{"0":"post-873270","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-flag-football","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-girls-football","11":"tag-high-school","12":"tag-kshsaa","13":"tag-practices","14":"tag-schools","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-students"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116457611203024759","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=873270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/873271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=873270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=873270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=873270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}