Manning Passing Academy boosts girls flag football growth across states

Eli Manning put girls flag football inside the Manning Passing Academy’s quarterback showcase at Nicholls State University, giving the fast-growing sport a prime slot at a camp that drew more than 1,200 high school quarterbacks, wide receivers, tight ends and running backs. The 30th edition of the academy ran June 25-28 in Thibodaux, Louisiana, and Manning used the sessions to highlight how far girls flag has climbed in the football conversation.

That matters because the Manning camp has long been one of the sport’s most recognizable instruction platforms, built around the Manning family name and the kind of position-specific coaching that usually feeds tackle football. When that stage makes room for girls flag football, it does more than add one more drill line. It gives the sport a legitimacy marker, the kind that comes when elite instruction, visible endorsements and a quarterback academy with national pull decide girls flag belongs in the same room.

The academy also carried local weight beyond the field. Nicholls State has said earlier economic-impact analyses projected more than $15 million in local impact over a six-year period, a reminder that the Manning camp is not just a summer stop but a recurring business engine for the Bayou Region. That footprint now overlaps with a sport that has exploded almost as fast as it has standardized.

The numbers behind girls flag football show why the timing matters. The National Federation of State High School Associations said in January 2025 that girls flag was the next emerging high school sport, with most of its growth coming in the previous five to seven years. At that point, nine states had sanctioned the sport and 17 more were in pilot stages. By the 2025-26 season, 16 state associations had sanctioned girls flag football and 18 more states had independent or pilot programs.

NFHS went further in August 2025, releasing its first national rules book for high school girls flag football. The federation said participation had more than doubled nationally, from 20,875 players in 2022-23 to 42,955 in 2023-24, a 105% jump. It also said about 500,000 girls ages 6-17 played flag football in 2023, up 63% from 2019, with another boost coming from the sport’s inclusion in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics.

Florida remains the longest-standing pipeline, with more than 360 schools and almost 10,000 participants, and the college level is starting to follow. Sacramento State is among the schools moving toward women’s flag football, a sign that the path from high school sanctioning to higher-ed opportunities is getting clearer. With Eli Manning helping put girls flag on the same marquee as the camp’s traditional quarterback work, the sport is no longer asking for space. It is being placed at the center of football’s next growth lane.