A new women's competitive collegiate flag football team, the only one in the state, will take to the home field for the first time this weekend.
Siena Heights University, which announced plans for a team in 2023, has started its first season as interest in flag football accelerates across Michigan, particularly at the high school level where at least 18 girls teams are starting up across metro Detroit this year.
The new team made its official debut on the road in Florida earlier this month, and has played 14 games with a record of 7-7.
The team at the private Catholic college in Adrian, about an hour and a half southwest of Detroit, is eager to showcase the excitement surrounding the sport in front of a home crowd.
"We're really excited. It's one of those things where being the first in the state, the first in the conference, we're not fortunate enough like these other teams that can drive up the road, scrimmage a local rival school or anything like that," Siena Heights Flag Football Coach Jesse Siordia said. "These girls have been putting in a lot of work competing against each other."
The team has spent their first month on the road traveling through Florida, Illinois and Kentucky facing more established teams across the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the governing body of athletics in which Siena Heights participates. Siordia said he wanted to play tougher teams first to test out his teams toughness.
"Our first week is a brutal schedule and I created it that way on purpose cause I wanted to see how we take a punch in the mouth and see what we're gonna do, if we're going to respond or rollover and kinda wither away," said the Navy veteran who coached a team in Pontiac and was part of Under Armour's flag football program. "It'll tell me a lot, and I think these girls are up for the challenge and can compete against the four-year programs."
The inaugural roster is made up of 17 players, mostly freshman who hail from Florida, where flag football has been a sanctioned high school sport for more than two decades, according to the National Federation of State High ...
