Flag football touches down at Cedar
In 2022, it was announced that flag football would join Cedar Shoals’ athletics. Two years later in 2024, the inaugural team started practices. The varsity team was announced on Sept. 16 with their first game on Oct. 2. The Jags’ current record is 2-3.
Coaching the team is Shaquille Gatlin, a class of 2011 Cedar alumni and current athletic director at W.R. Coile Middle School. While Gatlin has no previous experience with flag football, he played wide receiver for the Mars Hill University football team.
“I want to get it (the team) off the ground, up and running and to win and add another positive aspect to the Cedar Shoals culture,” Gatlin said.
Gatlin is ready to motivate the players, and sophomore Beatriz Alvear-Garcia says he is effective.
“I think coach is funny and someone I can trust and go to when there is something wrong. He makes us motivated and helps us learn to do things better,” Alvear-Garcia said.
Complementing Gatlin is assistant coach Kathryn Ashmore, a social worker at the Athens Neighborhood Health Center. Ashmore also has no previous flag football experience, but she played club ultimate frisbee while attending at Armstrong State University. Ashmore wants flag football to be a pride point for the school.
“I want to create something that Cedar Shoals can be proud of, almost like a legacy that gives everybody something to cheer for and be excited about,” Ashmore said.
Not only does flag football bring new excitement and pride to Cedar, it also brings high interest. 82 prospective players attended the interest meeting and 76 tried out, a record for the most female athletes that have tried out for a sport at Cedar Shoals. 33 of them made the team.
“We’re trying to grow all of our athletic teams, and to see almost 80 girls show interest in some way, that’s a win for us,” athletic director L’Dreco Thomas said.
The interest of flag football not only comes from it being a new sport, but also from seeing boys playing football and wanting to play as well.
“As girls, we want to play football when we see the boys playing. Now we finally have (a team),” junior safety Ky’Esha Gainer said.
In flag football, tackles are substituted for pulling the flag on the ball carrier’s waist. Ashmore says the team has focused on this specific skill.
“Flag football is a lot of stop and go in this direction, that direction. So definitely a lot of drills, a lot of running and defense, knowing how to pull the flag. If you don’t know how to pull the flag, you’re not going to get anywhere,” Ashmore said.
Instead of the 11 players that football has, seven players make up a flag football team. Another difference is that the flag football field is 70 by 30 yards, compared to a regulation football field measuring 100 by 53 yards. Even though the team is already familiar with the rules of tackle football, learning the structure of flag football has taken time.
“We’re practicing hard, we’ve been putting in for this, and I feel like we’re gonna be ready to play. Like I told them, we might have our ups and downs, but it’s getting better now, week by week,” Gatlin said.
Gatlin remains optimistic about the inaugural season, and his team matches that excitement. They are eager for new opportunities, new friendships and scholarships.
“You can get scholarships to college for flag football. There’s professional flag football. It’s being put into the Olympics in the coming years. So there’s a lot of opportunities for them,” Ashmore said.
The 2024-25 high school flag football playoffs will be held at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta from Dec. 2-11. To be able to make it to the playoffs the Jags’ have to make the top four in their region: Division 2, Area 8. This region contains East Jackson, Monroe Area, Morgan County, North Oconee, Oconee, Seckinger and Walnut Grove. This is different from Cedar’s tackle football team’s region, 4A Region 8, which consists of East Forsyth, Eastside, Flowery Branch, Madison County, North Oconee, and Walnut Grove.
This year the Jags face a tough schedule, going up against 2023 region Division 2, Area 8, champion North Oconee. Last year Clarke Central landed third in the region going 6-2, prompting a high stakes Classic City Championship. The Jags’ first set of games was against Central Gwinnett, who went undefeated last year, and Winder Barrow, who finished 5th in their region going 3-4.
While there will be only a varsity team this season, there are plans to add a junior varsity team next year.
“We’re starting this season with one team this fall, just to get this program started. In the spring we will have a varsity and JV tryouts,” Gatlin said.
