Charles Herron knows a thing or two about football.
He’s been the defensive coordinator at West Point, one of the most successful programs in Mississippi, for the past 15 years. In his tenure, the Green Wave have reached the last 10 Class 5A state championship games and won six.
However, this offseason has been a bit different for him compared to years past. This spring, Herron is coaching West Point’s first ever girls flag football team.
“It was just a change of pace, going from being really, really stern and coaching on a high level with my guys here to starting back at the genesis of football again with the girls,” Herron said.
Herron keeps in touch with former classmates at Mississippi State who are also coaches. Some of them started programs at Meridian and South Pike last season. He was also sent a video from the New Orleans Saints that explained the intricacies of the sport. Herron then went to West Point’s athletics director, Brad Cox, who helped get the program started.
Tryouts started with 70 girls coming out. Herron kept 35 in the program, with 25 in high school and 10 in junior high. The team practices three days a week and has been getting familiar with the rules of the game.
“It has brought such a vibrant feel around this school, around the community, with us having our first home game this Thursday,” Herron said. “I mean, the outpour from people just calling and supporting us has been great. The community has been behind us. They’re behind us. Anything that the Green Wave does. This community supports these children 100%.”
About half an hour north in Aberdeen, Alex Williams has been able to take the initiative.
Williams has not only been the school’s head football coach for seven years, but he is also the athletics director. He is constantly looking for opportunities for students to get involved, and girls flag football presents just that. About 28-30 girls showed up for tryouts, and the ball’s been rolling ever since.
“I had to do a lot of reading and research on flag football, watching a lot of YouTube videos and seeing how people were playing the game, because it is a completely and totally different game from actual football. So there was a lot of studying on my part,” Williams said. “I treat it like an actual football practice. We work on fundamentals, as far as catching the ball, throwing the ball, and flag pulls, which is harder than what people may think.”
Last year, Williams went to elementary and middle schools in town with Fernando Davis, the head of the Aberdeen Parks and Recreation Department, and asked students what sports they would like to see. Many of the girls said flag football.
“We have a lot of kids that want to actually be a part of this. I had to turn away a few junior high students just so I could give the seniors an opportunity, if there were any more seniors that wanted the opportunity to play,” Williams said. “Everybody’s excited about it, man. I was very excited about it.”
Growing fast
West Point and Aberdeen are the first two area schools to field girls flag football teams. The sport started last year with help from both the MHSAA and the New Orleans Saints.
Girls flag football included 12 schools last season. All of them were within a three-hour drive of New Orleans so that the Saints, who provided equipment, officials, uniforms and more, could make the trip easily.
Now the MHSAA is responsible for those things. This has allowed 32 more schools across the state to put their hats in the ring.
“As people see the games, they want to be a part of it. Because it’s not your 1970’s powder puff,” LeAnna Dawson, assistant director of the MHSAA, said. “These are games like you would see … right now on some ESPN (networks), they have the USA flag football. It’s that caliber of talent.”
Girls flag football has one class of 44 teams divided into eight regions. West Point and Aberdeen are in Region 1 alongside Southaven, Coahoma County, North Panola and Charleston.
The regular season consists of five games over five weeks, with one game being played per week. Each school within a region hosts all of that week’s games once. West Point hosted Thursday on its football field, and Aberdeen will host on April 23 on its field.
Each game consists of two 20-minute halves. The first 18 minutes are running-clock and the last two are stoppage time. At the conclusion of the regular season, the top two teams in each region will face each other the following week and narrow the field to eight. The remaining teams will play in a one-day state tournament on Saturday, May 9 at Mississippi College in Clinton.
“It’s been a win-win for everyone involved,” MHSAA executive director Ricky Neaves said. “An economic boost for all the officials that are in it, schools make a little money on it, and it is a great opportunity for these young ladies to compete in football.”
In the sport’s short time in the Magnolia State, some girls have been able to use flag football to get opportunities at the college level. Dawson feels that it speaks to the kind of talent present in Mississippi.
“We’re also seeing, last year, even though it was only 12 teams, several of the teams had girls to get scholarship offers to play flag football,” she said. “And so we’re looking for the same and even more, potentially more of our flag athletes, to play at the next level.”
The Green Wave and Bulldogs each have a game under their belts, which were played on the campus of Southaven on March 26. West Point beat Coahoma County 8-6, but Aberdeen fell to Charleston 13-0.
Passion for football
It’s no secret what football means to West Point. The Green Wave have won 13 state championships, tied for the most in state history. That passion is being pretty closely replicated for girls flag football in a multitude of ways.
Many of Herron’s football players are his assistant coaches. He feels that they’ve been a tremendous help to the girls, both in terms of teaching them the game and helping to maintain that high-achiever mentality in the school.
“That has made the girls, the buy-in with the girls coming and having their friends that are the males in here that are state champions come out and coach, oh my God, it’s been wonderful,” Herron said.
The MHSAA is thinking big in regards to the future of the sport.
Both Dawson and Neaves are hoping for girls flag football to one day have seven classifications and, in turn, seven state championships. It may not happen quickly, or at all, but shooting for that kind of growth would be good for the sport regardless.
“It may be that we have a Class I and then have a 4A, 5A, 6A, 7A, so I don’t know that we’ll ever have full seven classifications,” Dawson said. “But that is our goal. To have seven standalone flag football championships.”
The MHSAA will gauge interest from schools who do not currently have programs via email in July. Depending on how many want in, the MHSAA may be able to create multiple classifications and new regions. Neaves expects several of them to say that they’re interested in fielding a team.
Herron loves where West Point’s program is headed. His biggest reason why has been how the underclassmen players continue to grow as athletes, with help from their upperclassmen teammates.
“I’ve seen those girls go from just being very shy, not really just knowing how to carry themselves like an athlete, and I see him every day walking and moving like an athlete,” Herron said. “So the program is going in the right direction.”
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