With a new season comes new sports, and for Puyallup High School, this is taken literally.
This year, the school is adding girls flag football to the program. Though not yet an official sanctioned WIAA sport, girls flag football is making its debut and will soon be among the ranks of volleyball, baseball, football, swimming and other WIAA sports Puyallup has to offer.
The decision to add girls flag football was a smooth one, according to Athletic Director Kelly Susee. This year, Puyallup received an audit from the Civil Rights Division at the national government and based on the school population and district-wide turnout for athletics, the girl’s population was underrepresented. Because of Title IX, an Educational Amendment stating that no person may be excluded from a program based on sex, the school grasped the importance of adding another girls sport and were able to finalize the choice.
“Over the last year or so, we’ve been having the conversation about what sport we would like to add, to try to help bridge that gap. Flag football became the conversation,” Susee said.
Later, it became clear that adding flag football was the right choice.
“The Seahawks were willing to give any school that participated in flag football this year a grant to help offset some of those costs. Each school was given $4,000 to help offset uniform costs and equipment for flag football.” Susee said.
The money received from the Seahawks will make up for about half of the cost to get the program up and running. It will cover coaches’ salaries, uniforms, equipment and officials.
Along with costs, however, putting together and running a new sport takes effort and responsibility. Susee, as the new SPSL commissioner for Girls Flag Football, is up for the challenge and plans to run the sport home. Susee has been working to create schedules, find officials, and even set up a Jamboree with the Seahawks.
Susee’s efforts are not in vain, as there is already a multitude of students preparing to try out the young sport. Sofia Wilson, a sophomore at Puyallup High School, is one of them.
“I used to play for a co-ed team, then the guys started to get 10 feet tall and it was getting dangerous for me. Now I can play with people my size,” Wilson said.
Bowie McNally, a junior, is another future tryout for Puyallup.
“I wanted to play because I thought it would be fun. I never have before, it would be something different. Out of this season, I want to get good camaraderie with other people and get in shape for track season,” McNally said.
As the future head coach of the sport and a physical education teacher at Puyallup, Mikalya Tanis says she plans to accomplish all this and more. Tanis wants them to know the sport like it’s the back of their hand.
“I want them to come out there not knowing anything and leaving a professional. Knowing how to play the game, even better than the regular football players. “
Not only that, but Tanis said she wants to create an empowering and auspicious environment.
“I want them to have fun. I want them to win, too, but I want more than anything for these girls to feel empowered and feel like they have a good support system around them,” Tanis said.
As the coach, however, Tanis knows that these things won’t just appear out of thin air. It involves a lot of strenuous work and hours of planning.
“You have to create what the values are going to be, uniforms, you have to think about funding, you have to think about who you want behind you as far as your coaching staff goes, and then building up the rules as far as what I’m looking for from my athletes,” Tanis said. “All of those behind-the-scenes things, and I found out with less than a month before the season starts.”
Despite the hard work, Tanis is dedicated to making these teams the best they can be. She shares a time during her years at PHS when they held a spring powderpuff league for flag football. It was made up of two sophomore teams, two junior teams and two senior teams.
“We would compete against each other, and there’d be a power puff champion. I was on the champion team, and it was so much fun,” Tanis said. “When I heard they were bringing real flag football, I knew I had to be a part of it. It’s just life-changing for young women to be able to participate in a sport that’s so technical and fun.”
