By Michael Wojtychiw

In its second year as a sport in the Chicago Public League, girls high school girls flag football nearly doubled in size, jumping to 48 teams from Chicago this season. The City Championship, sponsored by the Chicago Bears, NFL Flag and Nike featured current Chicago Bears Defensive Tackle Justin Jones, who served as honorary captain for the game.

The final four teams featured two newcomers in Lane and Morgan Park and two experienced squads in Taft and Kenwood.

Both experienced squads, who happened to make it to the semifinals of last year’s tournament, were back at it again, but one step further, as they made it to the city championship game Saturday night at Lane Stadium, both looking to win their first flag football city title.

“I really think it was just the year of growth,” Taft coach Germain Padilla said. “We’re a very young team, we only had two seniors on the field today. We’re a predominantly sophomore team, last year was predominantly freshmen.”

“I felt last year that while they were executing, they didn’t have the drive of understanding how to compete. This year, there was a different sense of not getting rattled when they don’t get down. They’ve gotten good at focusing on the next play, not what happened in previous plays. That’s where you saw the big growth of this team.”

Even though both teams had made deep runs last season, it was a couple of players who were new to the team that played the biggest roles in the Eagles’ 18-14 win. 

Freshman Lily Sarli made an impact right off the bat, rushing for 16 yards, including a six-yard score on the first possession of the drive to put the Eagles (8-0) up quickly. 

After stopping the Broncos (5-3) on their own 49, Sarli started the next drive with a 10-yard rush and capped it with a 15-yard scamper to the end zone to give Taft a 12-0 lead.

“Running around the end was really kind of my specialty,” Sarli said. “Our connection really grew as a team throughout the year and we became like one, that really helped us.

After the teams combined for back-to-back turnovers, Kenwood quarterback Trayce Brim-Harris used her experience in leading the Broncos to their first score of the game, completing passes to fellow senior Samya Ray before scampering her way for a 34-yard score to get the Broncos to within 12-6 at the half.

Brim-Harris continued her stretch of play, accounting for all 8- yards on the opening drive of the second half, capped by an 18-yard strike to Antaniya Woods and then a two-point extra point to give the Broncos the lead with 14:35 remaining in the game.

That, however, is when Taft’s Sarli, quarterback Maylin Nunez and Elena Gonzalez took over.

Sarli started the next drive with two runs for a combined 14 yards, Nunez completed a 31-yard pass to Maddie Beazley and then two passes to Gonzalez, including a nine-yard catch that gave the Eagles the 18-14 lead with 8:30 remaining.

Gonzalez, who plays shortstop for Padilla’s Taft softball team and is also a member of the girls basketball team, wasn’t even on the squad until a couple weeks ago when she decided to join the flag football team.

“My coach asked me to play two weeks ago and my sister and I had wanted to play flag football but we thought it would interfere with our travel basketball team and when it didn’t, I told coach ‘Ok, I’ll come play,’” Gonzalez said. “It’s been a lot of fun because I didn’t know how to play flag football before this or really anything about football in general and everyone brought us in and helped us. 

“It was a lot of fun learning and playing.”

Even though the Eagles had taken the lead, it didn’t mean they could start the celebration early. 

After holding Kenwood on its next possession to an incomplete pass on fourth down, Nunez connected on a 22-yard pass to Gonzalez, giving the team a first down. But a run that went for zero yards, an incomplete pass and two sacks by Kenwood’s Kia Shorts gave the Broncos the ball back with 56 seconds remaining.

A 10-yard Brim-Harris rush, followed by an incomplete pass, a 14-yard completion from Brim-Harris to Ray, a 14-yard scamper by Brim-Harris and a 30-yard pass to Gabrielle Speller got the ball to the four-yard-line, but the clock ran out before the Broncos could get a final snap off, starting a Taft celebration on the field.

For Taft, it truly seems to be a great year for the athletics program, as the boys soccer team recently just finished second in the city tournament, the lower-level football teams have had success, girls volleyball conference championship and an eighth-place team finish at the boys cross-country city championships, as well as a top-eight finisher, among other achievements.

“Last year in basketball, we lost against kenwood, so this was kind of like getting redemption for me and it felt good,” Gonzalez said. “It’s definitely something that I’ll be playing from the beginning of the year next year.

“To play with my sister is a lot of fun. We work together really well and with her being competitive, it really drives me to be better.”

“”For us, it’s just about trying to market the program,” Padilla said. “Hopefully this championship will bring some excitement among the rest of the girls in the school. But I’m a PE teacher and pulled a couple girls from the PE classes to come out and play. Hopefully the success of the program will bring out a number of more girls to come.”

Both Kenwood and Taft’s seasons aren’t over, however. Through the partnership with the NFL’s Chicago Bears, there will be a state playoff series featuring both the city teams, as well as the top team from the Rockford area and the top team from the West Suburban Conference. That will take place at the Bears’ Halas Hall in Lake Forest on October 29th.