Cal Poly newcomers Klam, Joncich make USA women’s flag team

Cal Poly added national-team firepower before its inaugural varsity snap, landing Ashlea Klam and Maci Joncich on USA Football’s 2026 U.S. women’s flag roster. USA Football listed Joncich, a WR/QB from Henderson, Nevada, and Klam, a C/DB from Austin, Texas, on a 12-player team with six alternates, a rare signal that the Mustangs are entering Division I play with athletes already tested on the international stage.

The timing matters as much as the names. Cal Poly hired Rod Sherman as its first women’s flag football head coach on March 3, and the school has spent the spring building a roster around players with elite experience rather than simply filling out a startup program. Sherman’s resume includes a CIF Southern Section Division II championship at Orange Lutheran High School, and the early structure of the roster suggests the Mustangs want immediate legitimacy, not a slow-burn rebuild.

Klam brings that credibility in bulk. She played the last two seasons at Keiser University, earned all-conference honors in each year, and was selected for Team USA for the fourth straight season. That kind of continuity is hard to overstate in a sport still defining its college-to-national-team pipeline. Cal Poly is not just getting a transfer; it is getting a player the national team has already trusted repeatedly.

Joncich’s path is even more eye-catching. USA Football’s 2024 roster and media guide identified her as the youngest member of that team after she made the squad as a high school senior. Before that, she played on the 2022 15U and 2023 17U girls’ U.S. teams that won gold at the Junior International Cup, and she first turned heads by leading Florida to the NIRSA national title and earning tournament MVP honors as a freshman. By the time she arrived in San Luis Obispo, she had already been through the highest-level developmental pipeline in the sport.

That pipeline ran directly through U.S. competition again in June, when USA Football’s IFAF Americas coverage showed Joncich connecting with Klam on a touchdown pass. Now both players are headed to Düsseldorf, Germany, where the 2026 IFAF World Flag Championship is set for Aug. 13-16. USA Football says the women’s national team is 33-1 dating back to the 2018 world championships, and the U.S. won gold in Lahti, Finland, in 2024 by beating Mexico 31-18.

Cal Poly’s club sports page showed women’s club flag football already existed on campus before the varsity launch, but this roster push goes well beyond campus growth. It shows a new Division I program can sell something more valuable than playing time: immediate access to an international stage, before a player ever takes a college snap.