Nordonia High School, in Northeast Ohio’s Macedonia, recently won the first girls flag football state championship sanctioned by the Ohio High School Athletic Association.
The championship on May 16 was streamed online and televised statewide, showing that the football field – once a boys-only space – is for girls, too.
Football, from pee-wee to the pros, means a lot to Ohio. High school football in the state has drawn crowds for over 130 years. But, for most of those years, girls have been largely excluded, forced to watch the boys from the sidelines.
Eternity Foster knows that feeling well.
From an early age, she loved football, but when it came time to join a youth league, football didn’t love her back. Instead of a helmet and shoulder pads, she was handed pom-poms and a cheer uniform.
Her experience isn’t unique. Girls’ participation in tackle football remains rare. Data from the National Federation of State High School Associations shows that in 2025, just 59 high school girls suited up for 11-player tackle football in Ohio, compared to nearly 40,000 boys.
Foster got to play other sports like softball, but when it came to football, she remained sidelined.
“I was told I would get hurt, and it wasn’t for us,” Foster said. “But our school finally just put together a flag football team, and we’re here.”
New opportunities to play
Now, on a practice field across from Princeton High School, outside of Cincinnati, Foster isn’t a cheerleader. She’s a run-stopping, quarterback-blitzing linebacker.
“As a linebacker, I know I’m blitzing. So I’ve got to find the ref, find the blitz line, be ready to go and get the flag,” she said.
Princeton’s team is brand new, built from scratch this past spring by one of the coaches from the boys tackle football team. Instantly, they’ve become one of the best teams in Ohio, making their way to the state finals after just a few months in existence.
Teammates Chanel Olverson and Elis Parrales both grew up with football-playing brothers. Olverson said she remembers watching her younger brother play when he was so little that he could barely run or catch a football.
Now, on their newly formed team, the duo is taking every opportunity to show what they can do.
“We just beat a team by 30,” Olverson exclaimed.
“Yeah, we did. The game lasted like ten minutes.” Parrales added.
Participating in the most popular sport
Many girls, like the ones at Princeton, have been waiting for their chance to shine between lines, said J.A. Carter, University of Cincinnati Blue Ash sociology professor, and former women’s tackle football player for the Cincinnati Sizzle.
But they’ve been shut out because of the masculinity and violence associated with football.
“Opportunities in football have been limited over time due to long-standing, long-held beliefs about gender,” Carter said. “You know what it means to be ladylike. Football is kind of the antithesis of that.”
In some cases, that masculine focus has resulted in gender-based bans. In 2013, one central Ohio school district banned a seventh-grade girl from joining her school’s tackle football team. They later made an exception after legal pressure from the ACLU.
Now, flag football has more girls playing a version of the game, and it’s leading to more prominent female voices in the sport.
“Participating in the sport that’s most exalted or valued in the U.S. culture is important in and of itself. You get to learn the language, the positions, the strategies, and it gives you the opportunity to participate in the conversations that perhaps have been more difficult to participate in the past,” Carter said.
‘Fulfilling a lot of girls’ dreams’
Over in Hamilton, north of Cincinnati, another one of 8 state finalists, Badin High School, is looking to turn its program into a powerhouse after a hot start. They were Ohio’s top team last year, before the sport was officially sanctioned, and have twice played games inside Paycor Stadium.
That’s a big deal for Badin center and Bengals fan, Lexi Brecht.
“That was really cool to just say, ‘I played on that field where Joe Burrow throws, and Ja’Marr Chase catches,’” she said.
The recognition is great, but the most valuable part for her is the community being built.
“It’s just kind of fulfilling a lot of girls’ dreams,” Brecht said. “I personally like meeting other girls that are also passionate about the same thing.”
That community in Ohio is now 162 teams strong and growing.