In recent weeks at Redwood Middle School, the final school bell has rung and the athletic field has been filled with 42 JV and varsity flag football players wearing green and red flags.
The co-ed sport is open to all middle school students, with practices held Monday through Thursday from 3:30 to 5 p.m. The teams are divided by grade level, with varsity consisting of seventh and eighth grade students and JV composed solely of sixth graders. The teams are being coached by Stanley Sherman, and he is getting assistant coaching help from juniors Jayden Kwong and Brennan Pak, both key members of the Saratoga High varsity squad.
Added as an official sport to Redwood two years ago, flag football is relatively new, but the team has been performing well, with varsity and JV boasting 5-3 and 6-1 records respectively as of early February in the West Valley Athletic League. The teams play alongside eight other local schools, including C.T. English and Sherman Oaks. Their season lasts from Dec. 9 to Feb. 5.
With the sport gaining impressive popularity these past years, the coaches say they try their best to make sure everyone receives playing time.
Kwong and Pak mainly focus on the middle school’s JV team, while also guiding varsity players by offering advice when needed. Both played flag football before tackle football; Kwong started flag football when he was in second grade and picked up tackle football in eighth grade, while Pak started flag football in fourth grade and continued with tackle in ninth grade.
Knowing the two of them were on Saratoga’s football team, Sherman texted them with a paid coaching opportunity this winter. Their love for football pushed them to help out and even create an Instagram account for the team and their coaching journey: @jbcoaching25. Having taken inspiration from another coach’s flag football TikTok account, they have started posting photos of wins and team moments.
As coaches, Kwong and Pak try to hone their players’ defensive skills on JV and varsity while Sherman covers offense training. For Kwong, many of his successful strategies as defensive coordinator originated from his experience in the “Madden NFL” American football video game series.
Said Kwong, “I won’t take full credit for this being the reason why I’m a good defensive coordinator. But I play a lot of Madden, and [my friends] always have me be the defensive coordinator. I applied it to flag football, and it somehow works. It’s funny, but video games help.”
However, while both juniors work with the defensive line, Kwong — a running back and cornerback on the Saratoga team — also coaches the middle school wide-receivers, another position he used to play. On the other hand, Pak, who usually plays middle linebacker and running back on the Saratoga team, mainly coaches the running backs on the Redwood team.
While the team still has a long way to go in building high school-ready skills, Pak notes that their greatest strength is their team chemistry. Many of the athletes are already friends with each other and students respect their coaches, making practices run smoothly.
Since several middle schoolers on the team have expressed interest in playing football in high school, Kwong and Pak try to implement aspects of tackle football such as types of agility work, speed drills, zone defense and running routes to smooth the transition from flag to tackle.
“I honestly think we should teach it to them now, because if they learn all this stuff now and are able to absorb it, by the time they get to high school, they’ll be really good,” Kwong said. “And with individual drills, it’s been cool to see how much they progress.”
Pak also does paid private football lessons with some of the students, and Kwong occasionally joins him. Pak enjoys being able to work with the kids and teach them meaningful lessons, so he plans to continue teaching private lessons over the summer.
While the technical skill-based aspect of coaching is essential, both Kwong and Pak agree that the community-based aspect is just as — if not more — important.
“[Playing flag football] builds camaraderie, right? So if they can all stick together and play tackle football, that’s cool,” Kwong said. “And I hope to be able to guide [the eighth graders] next year too when I’m a senior. I think [my favorite thing about coaching] is just being able to help people become better people, and teaching them life lessons while also teaching them how to be better football players.”
