Girls flag football set for inaugural season on Long Island

Alyssa Papasodero’s first sport is hockey. But when it comes to football, well, she’s enthused about that, too.

The Massapequa senior’s dad, Vinny, is a Jets season-ticket holder who used to work for the team. Father and daughter have been known to toss a football around. And when she isn’t on the ice, she enjoys watching the NFL and playing the sport on a fun day in November.

“On Thanksgiving, we usually — all my family, my cousins — go outside and we fool around with the football and play a little Thanksgiving football,” she said. “I do know how to catch a football and run and all that good stuff.”

That’s going to come in handy now.

The Jets High School Girls Flag Football League, in conjunction with Nike, started in New Jersey last year and is expanding to Long Island for the first time. Nine teams in Nassau and eight in Suffolk will begin play this month in a pilot program.

“I thought this was a fantastic opportunity to try something different for my senior year since I don’t play a spring sport,” Papasodero said.

The Neumann University-bound hockey player is one of 36 on Massapequa’s flag football team, which will host Freeport at Berner Middle School on Monday at 5 p.m.

“It doesn’t matter winning or losing,” Papasodero said. “It’s about being a part of a brand-new team and starting this from the ground up and making a name for it across Long Island.”

Juleesah Hines also is experiencing these new flag days. She’s on North Babylon’s track and field team this spring, and the senior is on the football roster.

“I feel like I’m the perfect advocate that’s a student-athlete, and football runs in my family,” Hines said. “My father did it. My brother did it.

“Ever since I heard about it, I’m like, yeah, that would be really cool to do because it’s like following the legacy of my family with playing football.”

And so far?

“I love it,” Hines said. “I really do. It’s really fun.”

After the eight-game Nassau regular season and the seven-game Suffolk schedule, there will be semifinals and finals. The Long Island championship game will be played June 4 at the Atlantic Health Jets Training Center in Florham Park, New Jersey.

“I think this is going to take off,” said Pat Pizzarelli, executive director of Section VIII, Nassau’s governing body for high school athletics. “ . . . The fall is overloaded with girls sports. So it’s not going to move it to the fall, for sure. I think we keep it in the spring.”

There are 51 teams in the pilot program across six New York sections. Todd Nelson, the assistant director for the NYSPHSAA, said the Jets offered grants to schools in Section VIII and XI, the Giants in Section I and IV and the Bills in Section V and VI.

Nike gave $100,000 of product credit to the NYSPHSAA that was split between the Jets, Giants and Bills.

“Uniforms,” Nelson said.

And cleats.

If the interest continues and a minimum of four schools in four different sections commit for next year, that would result in emerging sport status and possibly regional championships. If there are at least four schools in six sections, a state championship will be possible, although Nelson said that won’t begin in 2023.

“I would anticipate next year it moving to a quote-unquote ‘varsity status’ if we get that emerging sport status for our association,” Nelson said.

Section XI, Suffolk’s governing body, currently considers it a high school activity. Section VIII considers it a pilot varsity sport.

The Jets will continue with some funding for the existing teams next year. But if this officially goes varsity, the ultimate goal is for the schools to pay so the Jets can fund new teams.

“Next year, we hope to grow it, if we can, to more [Nassau] schools,” Long Beach athletic director Arnie Epstein said.

After leaving high school coaching for a while, Lori DeVivio is the co-coach for Long Beach with former Hofstra and CFL quarterback Rocky Butler.

DeVivio played receiver and cornerback for the New York Sharks and made that former professional women’s tackle football team’s hall of fame. She also played club flag football.

“This is the one thing that would definitely get my coaching juices flowing now,” DeVivio said. “I’ve been waiting for this moment to come out here.”

Her team has 28 players.

“They’re going to have a blast,” DeVivio said. “ . . . They understand the gravity of the situation of them now becoming pioneers of a girls sport.”

Bellmore-Merrick’s team has drawn from Calhoun, Bellmore JFK and Mepham.

“If it warrants having multiple teams [next year], we’ll have multiple teams,” district AD Eric Caballero said.

Sachem East and Sachem North each had more than 100 girls originally express interest. About 60 showed up to try out at East and 45 at North.

“We’re going to look to carry 25 [on each],” said Phil Torregrosa, the district’s assistant AD and Section XI’s girls flag football chair. “The Jets [and Nike] donated 25 uniforms, both home and away.”

Center Moriches, a smaller school, features 14 players.

Chloe Raupp said her previous football experience was kicking field goals in the summertime for fun, and it “helped me with soccer, too.”

Now the sophomore is a receiver/running back/defensive back.

“It will be a lot to get used to, but I think we’ll be really good this year,” Raupp said. “I’m a little nervous, but I’m really excited.”