Fiesta Bowl Flag Football Classic to be featured on ESPN

Fiesta Bowl Flag Football Classic to be featured on ESPN

The first-ever national collegiate flag football tournament featuring Division I universities is going to be on a national stage.

The Fiesta Bowl Flag Football Classic presented by Oakley, which will be hosted from April 18-19 in Tempe at Arizona State University, will be telecast live exclusively on ESPNU and the ESPN app. The championship game and semifinal games will be featured.

“This is a monumental step with our teammates at ESPN to bring the championship game and a semifinal to a nationwide audience. It is game-changing for our event, for the future of women’s collegiate flag football and it validates where this sport is headed,” said Erik Moses, executive director & CEO of the Fiesta Sports Foundation, in a press release.

With teams from Arizona State, Alabama State, Charlotte, University of Florida, University of Georgia, Grand Canyon University, University of Central Florida (UCF), and University of Southern California (USC) set to compete, the schools will get to showcase their club flag football teams in front of a much larger audience than before.

“Flag football is one of the most compelling growth stories in sports,” said Kurt Dargis, senior director of programming and acquisitions at ESPN, said in a press release. “Collaborating with Fiesta Sports Foundation on this inaugural event reflects our shared commitment to elevating the game and expanding opportunities for women’s sports. Putting this championship on a national stage allows the storytelling that ESPN is known for as we inspire the next wave of flag football players and fans.”

Phoebe Schecter and play-by-play announcer Kyle Bailey will be on the call for ESPN.

Schecter is one of the most recognized and influential voices in flag football on the global stage as a flag football analyst for ESPN, the Fanatics Flag Football Classic and other events. She is the former captain of Great Britain's women’s national flag football team, helping lead the country to a silver medal in the 2022 IFAF Women's World Championship before retiring from the national team in 2024. As a coaching intern for the Buffalo Bills, she became the first British woman to coach in the NFL. Schecter also serves as an NFL Global Flag ambassador and an NFL analyst for Sky Sports.