On the eve of the second ladies flag soccer state championship in Illinois, it was introduced that the game might be performed by men and women on the 2028 Los Angeles Summer Olympics. Added with 4 different sports activities — baseball/softball, cricket, lacrosse and squash — by the International Olympic Committee on Monday, the information was obtained enthusiastically by Gustavo Silva, the Chicago Bears supervisor of youth soccer and neighborhood packages.
“This is a big moment for all of us,” Silva mentioned. “Anybody that loves the game of football, this is a good day. The bar has been raised. It’s exciting to think that governments and corporate sponsors are going to now support it more because everything has to be multiplied to the next level. That’s the challenge ahead of us. But it is a challenge that we welcome.”
Silva has been an enormous proponent of women flag soccer in Illinois. Last fall, he was on the Walter Payton Center, together with Bears Care, internet hosting the primary ladies’ flag state championship. This summer season, Silva was on the Lake Forest campus when the Chicago Bears hosted a meet-and-greet with native gamers and coaches and Diana Flores, the captain and quarterback for the Mexico Women’s National Flag Football Team.
Silva mentioned the Chicago Bears have been placing cash and assets behind ladies flag soccer programming with hope of the game serving as a extra accessible, equitable and inclusive path to the soccer ecosystem for women and girls.
Last yr, Silva was targeted on ensuring flag soccer would turn into an Illinois High School Association-sanctioned varsity sport. The Chicago Bears Girls Flag Football Program collaborated with Chicago Public Schools in 2021 and created a ladies flag soccer league with 22 CPS groups. The league has since expanded to over 100 groups throughout the state, together with greater than 60 CPS colleges and extra leagues in Rockford and the Western suburbs.
This yr, Emma Jazmin Valenzuela, Karla Rodriguez Martinez and Saniya Shotwell, all a part of the Bears ladies flag soccer leagues, accepted school scholarship presents in flag soccer.
“It’s in the process … it’s going to be official in February. Everything is indicating that is going to happen,” Silva mentioned of women flag soccer being sanctioned by the IHSA. “Think about what this information does for that call. How do you vote towards an Olympic sport?
“It’s going to create a lot of positive momentum, positive pressure to grow the game at the grassroots level. Grassroots is really what has grown this thing to the Olympic movement, but the Olympic movement in turn is going to really push grassroots.”
Now with flag soccer within the 2028 Summer Olympic Games, Silva’s private objective is ensuring ladies from Chicago are on that inaugural staff. He was in Los Angeles when the Olympic Games have been performed there in 1984, and he hopes to be in his house state in 2028 to see flag soccer take its first Olympic steps.
“To be a little piece of sand within that ecosystem that has grown the game of football is tremendously humbling and gratifying,” Silva mentioned. “In terms of the interest in it from the games that I’ve gone to see, and so many schools playing it as a homecoming game, there’s a tremendous amount of support there. The interest in this has grown tremendously. I think that next year when it is an official IHSA sport and we do have championships in a big venue, I would expect the stands to be packed and for it to have support on par with boys football.”
The Tribune spoke with Silva to study extra in regards to the subsequent steps after the Olympic announcement. The following dialog has been edited for size and readability.
Were folks on the sting of their seats with the choice or did you firmly assume it was going to occur?
Both. I feel we have been undoubtedly on the sting of our seats, however we did really feel very strongly that it might be … whenever you’re in and also you’re dwelling it, you’ll be able to form of see how a lot momentum there may be and the way a lot want is raised for the sport and myself having the privilege to do a few of our worldwide initiatives when it comes to the expansion of youth soccer within the UK and in Spain, I’ve skilled it firsthand. So I do know that there’s a want for this all through the world. So I felt prefer it was there. But till you see it, till you hear that announcement. I woke as much as the announcement. I bought an electronic mail from a colleague very first thing this morning and the primary message I despatched was to Diana Flores congratulating her as a result of I understand how a lot this implies to her, to Amber Clark, and to 1000’s of women which have taken on this sport, particularly right here in Chicago. I do know that they’ve taken on this dream, to play on the collegiate stage, to play within the Olympics sooner or later, and it simply turns into that rather more tangible for them. It’s tremendously gratifying.
What are the following steps to creating flag soccer knowledgeable sport?
I feel it’s already occurring in some locations the place very small leagues are beginning to come about. I feel for it to occur in a method that’s sustainable, I feel that’s going to be post-Olympics, for my part. I really feel like if the sport of flag soccer each on the ladies’s and males’s sides has the super success that we anticipate it’s going to, I feel there’ll bethe starvation and the need for seeing some form of skilled league, in order that athletes have the chance to proceed to compete and develop as flag soccer gamers in these years between the Olympics. Numerous these athletes are working full-time jobs. Diana talked to us slightly bit in regards to the sacrifices that plenty of her teammates must make simply to be on a staff. This Olympic announcement is now going to hopefully push plenty of assets all through the world for these athletes in order that they will focus extra on being athletes and representing their nation and bringing house a medal for his or her nation. So that they don’t must sacrifice a lot. And it doesn’t must be such a battle for them to have the ability to showcase their expertise. And I consider that’s going to be the case right here within the States. And I consider that’s going to be the case in plenty of locations all through the world. I feel that the potential for knowledgeable league or skilled alternatives are going to return post-Olympics, however simply when it comes to assets, I feel it’s going to create much more alternatives for lots of different athletes to be a full-time athlete.
What will the Olympic announcement do when it comes to pleasure for the women flag soccer championships this month?
Oct. 28 and 29, our state championships will happen at Halas Hall once more. And truly, all of our native ladies groups are of their playoffs. Numerous them performed the primary spherical or their playoffs this previous weekend. On the weekend of Oct. 21 we anticipate 9 groups to qualify for the state event. I’m going over to Lane Stadium in Chicago to look at the Chicago Public League have its championships on that day. But all the opposite leagues are additionally having their championships on that day as nicely. I feel it’s going to amp up the thrill of the women. It’s going to amp up the eye that’s given to the game. I feel it does make it that rather more significant as a result of plenty of the women discuss eager to play on the collegiate stage, and sooner or later eager to enjoying within the Olympics, and it’s such an enormous step to take away that “if” — “if it becomes an Olympic sport?” It is an Olympic sport and now they’ve 5 years to prepare. To the athletes which might be enjoying at the highschool stage, enjoying on the collegiate stage, and to some athletes that haven’t taken on the game, could say, “Hey, now this is an Olympic sport, now I’m going to take on this sport.” That’s why I feel that the expansion goes to easily explode as a result of so many athletes discuss watching the Olympics once they’re younger and having that second of “I want to do that.” Now, to look at flag soccer within the Olympics, what number of tens of millions of athletes world wide are going to look at it and say, “I want to do that.” That’s going to be that catalyst that’s going to spark a dream in them.
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Source: www.bostonherald.com