Sabino hires Abbey Rustand to launch first flag football team

Sabino hired Abbey Rustand to coach its first girls flag football team, putting a 2019 graduate with club, youth and international experience in charge of the launch. The Sabercats will enter the sport as a 3A independent, a setup that gives a brand-new program room to build before it is asked to survive a conference grind.

Rustand already has the kind of résumé that can shorten the learning curve in year one. She is the offensive coordinator for Arizona’s club flag football program, coached the Girls 12U White team that won silver at USA Football’s Summer Series in Los Angeles, and has represented the United States in international flag football since 2024 as a receiver. In practical terms, that means Sabino is not starting from scratch with a first-time coach learning the sport on the job. Rustand has already lived in the spacing, timing and play-calling world that high school flag football now demands.

The hire also comes with built-in Sabino ties. Rustand is the daughter of Sabino girls basketball coach Eric Rustand and the granddaughter of Arizona basketball great Warren Rustand, a family connection that gives the program instant familiarity inside Tucson’s sports circles. Sabino’s alignment for the 2026-28 block lists football in 3A East but girls flag football in Football - Flag 3A Independent, a sign that the school is choosing flexibility as it introduces the program. Sabino’s girls flag page already shows a 2026-27 opener against Sahuaro on Nov. 3, 2026.

That context matters because Arizona girls flag football has moved fast. The AIA sanctioned the sport in December 2022, 55 schools played in the first official season in 2023-24, and the number jumped to 102 schools in 2024-25. Rustand is stepping into that growth curve with more than a local coaching résumé: USA Football’s 2026 Summer Series ran June 17-21 at Dignity Health Sports Park in Los Angeles and drew more than 1,000 athletes, coaches and personnel from around the country and abroad, while World Flag Series plans to stage WSF1 in Tampa on July 25, 2026. Even Rylen Bourguet, the Salpointe Catholic graduate who transferred to Nebraska for its first flag football team, is part of that same expanding network. Sabino’s first season will ask Rustand to turn all of that experience into a fast start.