Ottawa University flag football coach Liz Sowers continues to be a trailblazer for women’s flag football in the United States.
USA Football, the sport’s national governing body and member of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee, named Sowers as the head coach of the 2022 17U Flag National team.
Sowers is a four-time U.S. Women’s Football National Team player who helped lead three U.S. teams to gold medals in IFAF World Championship play across flag (2018) and tackle (2013, 2017). In her first season as the women’s flag football head coach at OU this past spring, Sowers guided the Braves to the NAIA’s inaugural national championship.
“I am extremely honored to be selected as the head coach of the 17U junior national team,” Sowers said. “The opportunity in this sport is continuously growing, especially with the potential of the Olympics on the horizon. I can’t wait to see these top athletes come together from around the country, perform as a unit, and represent the United States.”
Each U.S. girls team is comprised of a 12-player active roster. The Americans will face the world’s top girls flag national teams among their age group in June 2022 at an international friendly hosted by USA Football. Location and game dates of next summer’s global youth flag event will be announced in upcoming months.
All games will be played in a 5 vs. 5 format under International Federation of American Football (IFAF) rules. IFAF, an International Olympic Committee provisional member, is comprised of more than 70 American Football-playing member nations spanning six continents, nearly doubling its family of countries in the past 15 years.
U.S. Girls 15U Head Coach Elliott Giles is the founder of the Youngstown (Ohio) Youth Flag Football Association, which has earned numerous youth flag national championships while impacting more than 20,000 boys and girls since 2007.
Girls 17U assistant coach Jason Klam, of Austin, Texas, is the head coach of the Texas Fury Girls Flag Football program. Klam was named to USA Football’s Athlete and Coach Advisory Subcommittee earlier this year.
Sowers guided OU to an overall record of 14-1 and a KCAC record of 6-0. Ottawa had 15 All-KCAC performers, the KCAC Player of the Year, the KCAC Offensive Player of the Year and the KCAC Defensive Player of the Year. Ottawa captured the KCAC regular season championship, the KCAC Tournament championship and Sowers was named KCAC Coach of the Year.
Travis Burnett
A pioneer in the flag football community, Travis helped co-found the Flag Football World Championship Tour, FlagSpin and USA Flag. Featuring 15+ years of content creation for the sport of flag football, creating and managing the largest flag football tournaments on the planet, coaching experience at the youth and adult level as well as an active player with National and World Championship level experience.
