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The fast-growing sport of high school girls flag football notched another milestone Wednesday thanks to the signature of Nia Gille of El Dorado.
The senior signed as the first women’s flag football recruit for Hope International, the NAIA school in Fullerton announced on Instagram.
Hope International will field its first women’s flag football team in the 2025-26 school year.
“It is so exciting,” said Gille, who has played quarterback the past two seasons at El Dorado.
Girls flag football debuted in the CIF Southern Section in the fall of 2023 and concluded its first championships this past weekend.
Gille said she didn’t believe that she would play flag football in college until learning last month that Hope International was starting a program. She added that was already familiar with the university.
“(I) had made peace with the fact that I wouldn’t be able to continue playing college,” she said. “(But) on Oct. 10, Hope announced that they would have a flag football team next year and I was offered an opportunity to be the first recruit.
“Since I had been set on Hope pretty early on and didn’t think I would get to play flag, I did not look at any other colleges for flag.”
Women’s flag football is a sport at the NAIA level.
Hope athletic director Chris Morrison said Wednesday that the school is in the process of hiring a coach. He added that the women’s flag football will be a spring sport in 2026.