Ashlea Klam received a world championship in flag soccer – and is in prime place to pursue an Olympic gold medal for the US – with out ever having the possibility to compete for a state title at her highschool. And that’s one thing the 20-year-old from Texas is striving to alter with no matter time she will be able to discover away from her coaching and school courses.
“I believe it’s simply completely loopy that I’ve been capable of symbolize my nation at this sport, however I used to be by no means capable of symbolize my highschool,” mentioned Klam, who grew to become a world-class participant of a sport debuting on the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics largely due to a program based by her mother and father. “When states don’t have flag soccer of their sanctioned varsity sports activities … it hurts. It hurts deeply as a result of it’s taking away so many alternatives for youthful ladies to have the ability to play this sport.”
Three years out from the game’s Olympic debut, maybe no younger girl has embraced these alternatives fairly like Klam. She almost received a nationwide championship in flag soccer with Keiser College in Might. And in August, whereas nonetheless aged 19, she helped the US ladies’s flag soccer nationwide crew seize a 3rd consecutive world title.
She had a plethora of choices rising up in Texas’ state capital, Austin. The gifted multi-sport athlete excelled in soccer, volleyball, basketball, baseball, softball in addition to observe and subject. At one level she even acted, together with roles within the 2015 movie Jack’s Apocalypse, the Nationwide Geographic manufacturing The Lengthy Street House, and a TV present based mostly on the Sage Alexander younger grownup novel collection.
However nothing fairly piqued her curiosity like seeing her brother, Peyton, play flag soccer, the contactless cousin to the sort out model involving smaller groups, a reduced-sized subject and pulling flags from gamers’ hips to cease opposing ball carriers. And after years of being dragged round to his video games, Ashlea ultimately approached her mother and father, Jason and Amber, and mentioned, “Hey, no, it’s my flip,” her father recalled.
Supporting their daughter – then aged about seven – required Jason and Amber Klam to start out a crew in a neighborhood leisure league with Ashlea, a few different ladies and a number of other boys. Amber Klam recalled that the league technically was co-ed, however some squads had solely boy gamers. Nonetheless, as in her different sports activities, she stood out. And Klam later was recruited to pick groups – together with ones the place she was the one lady – that will journey out of city and take part in regionals hosted by the Nationwide Soccer League.
The coaches on the time ultimately moved on and requested whether or not the Klams needed to inherit management of the budding program. The Klams mentioned sure and in the end constructed the girls-only Texas Fury, deriving the identify from the mythological, vengeful Greek goddesses. The Fury has since expanded from a single, six-player squad to 10 groups in Austin and one other two teams within the Dallas-Forth Price space throughout a number of age divisions.
The Fury showcased Klam’s prodigious velocity, knack for getting the ball into the top zone to attain, and skill to command her teammates’ respect at a time when flag soccer’s reputation as an entertaining, much less bodily dangerous various to the sort out format was exploding. From 2014 to 2023, participation within the sport by youngsters between the ages of 6 to 17 elevated 38%, producing greater than 1.6m individuals in that vary – development that was mirrored within the Texas Fury group itself.
Lately, “we’re an 11-month program,” Amber Klam mentioned.
Ashlea in the long run narrowed her focus to flag on the expense of the opposite sports activities, together with performing. The knowledge of that call grew to become evident by the point she celebrated her nineteenth birthday in October 2023.
Keiser College by then had taken notice of the 5ft 10in Klam’s exploits with the Fury – amongst different qualities – and given her a scholarship to review sports activities administration in addition to play for its ladies’s flag soccer crew in West Palm Seaside, Florida. The Olympics had additionally introduced that the game can be amongst 5 making their debuts on the 2028 LA Video games. And the US ladies’s nationwide flag soccer crew – having already tried her out on one in every of its youth squads – had chosen Klam as a part of the senior facet that will be favored on the sport’s world championships in Finland in August.
“Taking that leap … was simply wonderful,” Klam mentioned.
The following outcomes had been equally so. She caught 79 passes for 1,1116 yards and 27 touchdowns as Keiser’s 18-win, two-loss Seahawks reached the Nationwide Affiliation of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA)’s championship recreation in Might.
Then, because the youngest member of the group, Klam caught the second-most passes (41) for Crew USA whereas contributing 367 receiving yards and 7 touchdowns in Finland. A type of scoring receptions got here within the US’s 31-18 gold medal recreation victory over Mexico to safe the Individuals’ third straight world championship – the sort of performancye that leaves her in placing distance of representing her nation on the Olympics, when she will probably be 23.
In between these exploits, Klam acquired to function a sports activities envoy with the US state division, touring to São Paulo, Brazil, to satisfy underprivileged youths there because the Tremendous Bowl kicked off in February.
But Klam mentioned she was bothered by the fact that her flag achievements of late got here regardless of missing varsity expertise throughout her time at Austin’s Vandergrift highschool.
Solely 13 US states had sanctioned ladies’ varsity highschool flag soccer on the conclusion of Klam’s breakout yr on the worldwide stage. Texas, the place soccer is one thing of a faith, is just not amongst them.
The complete Klam household has been working with NFL organizations such because the Houston Texans and Dallas Cowboys to extend the variety of counties that are providing the sport as a membership sport. The trouble primarily has concerned conferences with – and shows to – the College Interscholastic League, which governs highschool sports activities in Texas. It had progressed slightly past the midway level after Ashlea returned from Finland, with optimism surrounding the Texans’ pledge of $1.4m towards the expansion of ladies’ flag soccer.
USA Soccer, the group answerable for the game’s American nationwide groups, is doing what it might to construct the widest potential pool of Olympic hopeful flag soccer gamers. In late November, the physique started internet hosting a collection of expertise identification camps operating via the spring in about half of the NFL’s markets – from LA via Dallas to New England.
However in Klam’s view, because it stands, with a lot of the US missing a slate of varsity highschool flag soccer, the proverbial pipeline doesn’t prolong far again sufficient. If it ever does, there is no such thing as a telling what number of different women and girls can emulate her path, which – past a viable Olympic shot – has let her journey internationally at a scale she might solely dream about a number of years earlier.
“This sport has given me a lot greater than a gold medal or wins and losses,” Klam mentioned. “I need that … for each youthful lady who has the fervour for this sport.”
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