Flag Football Recommended as NCAA Women’s Emerging Sport

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA (February 13, 2025) – The NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics made a recommendation that Divisions I, II and III sponsor legislation to add flag football to the NCAA Emerging Sports for Women program.  

With the committee’s vote, the recommendation will move through the NCAA governance structures. All three divisions will have an opportunity to sponsor legislation to move the sport forward. The divisions will review updated statistics, current sports sponsorship numbers, financial considerations, potential timelines and other relevant topics before making a final decision on whether to add flag football to the Emerging Sports program.

Once in the program, a sport must have a minimum of 40 schools sponsoring the sport at the varsity level and meet minimum contest and participation requirements (as reflected in the NCAA Sports Sponsorship and Participation Rates Database) to be considered for championship status. In January, the three divisions moved women’s wrestling from the program to the NCAA’s 91st championship, with the first championship slated for winter 2026.  

“The growth of flag football will be exciting to watch in the NCAA as women’s sports continue to generate more visibility and opportunities for female student-athletes to excel academically and athletically,” said Ragean Hill, chair of the Committee on Women’s Athletics and executive associate athletics director at Charlotte. “The Committee on Women’s Athletics wants to thank RCX Sports Foundation and USA Football for submitting the application. CWA looks forward to flag football being added to the Emerging Sports for Women program and watching the sport’s exciting journey to NCAA championship status in the future.” 

Flag football has been one of the fastest-growing sports in the country. At least 65 NCAA schools are sponsoring women’s flag football at either the club or varsity levels this year, with more slated to join in 2026. Flag football also has been added as a sport for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.  

Currently, there are five sports in the Emerging Sports for Women program: acrobatics and tumbling, equestrian (Divisions I and II), rugby, stunt and triathlon. The program is intended to help schools provide more athletics opportunities for women and more sport-sponsorship options for schools.

Since the program was established in 1994, based on a recommendation from the NCAA Gender Equity Task Force, five women’s sports in addition to women’s wrestling have earned NCAA championship status: rowing (1996), ice hockey (2000), water polo (2000), bowling (2003) and beach volleyball (2015). In the 2023-24 academic year, those five sports collectively included nearly 14,000 student-athletes, about 6% of the total student-athletes competing in NCAA women’s championship sports, according to the most recent data.