Chesterton flag football kicks off as an emerging sport; Trojans take 1-2 record into tonight’s home game vs. 21st Century

Patrick Mochen
Onwardtrojans.com

The first that Chesterton students heard that the school would have a girls flag football team came in a morning announcement over the PA system last spring. It was just an opportunity back then. No coaches, no players, no games scheduled.
A few months later, Chesterton played its first game, losing to Michigan City 28-20 on September 8. The Trojans split a doubleheader with LaPorte the next day, losing the first game, 36-34, and winning the second, 12-6. The Trojans take a 1-2 record into today’s game vs. 21st Century Charter School at Chesterton Stadium, 6:30 p.m. kickoff.
Girls flag football is an emerging IHSAA sport, which can reach the status of IHSAA-sanctioned sport in a minimum of two years, as long as 100 schools have picked up the sport.
“I’m all for it. It gives them an opportunity to play organized football, when they otherwise wouldn’t have been able to,” Chesterton boys football coach Mark Peterson said.
Girls assistant track and field coach Kate Conway is the flag football team’s head coach and coordinates the defense. Boys head track and field coach Bryan Nallenweg is the defensive coordinator.
Senior Hailey Hostetter and junior Iabella Harvey split time at quarterback, leading an offense that incorporates some deep passes, some West Coast Offense, which is a horizontal passing game, and also uses jet sweeps.
“My philosophy is that we don’t need a lot of plays if we run them well,” Nallenweg said.
A common play for flag football teams is a jet sweep fake one way, run counter the other direction.
“It’s a pretty effective play for flag football,” Nallenweg said. “You have to have somebody who’s fast.”
Usually, that somebody is sophomore Emelia Franco, who leads the team in rush attempts.
The biggest offensive threat is Hostetter, who had three touchdowns against Michigan City: one rushing, one receiving, and one passing. She’s athletic enough to beat the rush and has a strong arm to get the ball downfield.
“When I first heard the announcement, I definitely wanted to play, because I always wanted to play football but didn’t want to deal with the boys,” Hostetter said.
For a different look, the positions will rotate and Harvey will go in at quarterback and Hostetter will play receiver.
“Hailey has a good arm and is really athletic, which is obviously important in flag football”, Nallenweg said. “Izzy is more of a passing quarterback. She’s really accurate. Freshman Lexi Gano has really good hands and probably gets half of the receiving touchdowns.”
Added Hostetter: “I didn’t think Nallenweg would know much about football since he is one of our track coaches. He knows a lot about football, much more than I thought he would.” Nallenweg and Conway both played flag football in college. Nallenweg jokingly said that he received inspiration for the offense from Indiana University football coach Curt Cignetti.