All-girls flag football league is coming to Knoxville

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) - Get ready Knoxville, because an all-girls flag football league is coming to town. GirlPower Flag Football will become Knoxville’s first-ever all-girl youth flag football league. The inaugural season is set to begin on August 23, 2026.

GirlPower Flag Football was established in 2022 and is an NFL-affiliated league open to girls in K-12th grade. The first season is coming this fall, but the fun will run for three seasons a year. There will be seasons in the Fall, Winter and Spring giving youth girls in the Knoxville area an opportunity to get in on the action.

The Knoxville expansion of GirlPower Flag Football will be directed by Arthur vonWerssowetz, General Manager. This league is special to him and his family as his daughter, Della, played in the first GirlPower Flag league while they lived in Florida. Now, they are excited to bring it to East Tennessee.

“This is just a really exciting time to get in on the ground floor of something,” vonWerssowetz said.

“When we learned that we were moving back to Knoxville, I started looking for all-girls leagues for our daughter to play in. It was a special thing that she got to be involved in while we were living down there [Florida], there must be something like this in Knoxville. When we looked into it, there just really wasn’t. Knoxville really deserves something like this. The young women who are playing flag now won’t just get to say, ‘I played flag football,’ they’ll get to say, ‘I built this sport,” he said.

Della is excited for the opportunity to play the sport she loves in her new home.

“I really just love being able to play football, because I always watched it with my parents but I never really understood it too much. I feel like after a couple of practices, I feel like I just knew. It was just so much fun and I got to go out there and just play,” Della said.

Girls flag football is booming right now. It is currently the fastest-growing youth sport in America. The sport is now part of the NCAA’s Emerging Sports for Women program as of January 2026. Also, the sport will make its debut at the Olympics in 2028 in Los Angeles.

The GirlPower Flag Football league is not just about playing the sport, but teaching young girls the game of football in a positive, enthusiastic and encouraging environment. GirlPower looks to not only instill confidence on the field, but off the field as well.

“We really try to curate an experience for the girls that really empowers them,” vonWerssowetz said. “It is really focused on building young women and giving them the opportunity to excel in the sport that we see being the future for young women with college scholarships and the Olympics in 2028. It is an emerging sport for the NCAA. It is a very, very exciting thing and when faced with the opportunity to bring this to Knoxville, it was kind of a no-brainer.”

“I feel like it is so fun, because I really love flag football and I am glad that when I am older, I get to play it in high school and in college,” Della said.

vonWerssowetz believes that Knoxville is the perfect spot for this league, largely in part to the rich love for football that the area already possess.

“People in Knoxville are ravenous about football,” vonWerssowetz said.

“I grew up in East Tennessee, my wife is from West Tennessee and we both went to Tennessee. We knew our kids would grow up around football, but this opportunity to bring this to women at a young age and help them really learn the sport, learn how to play it and excel at a high level. Also, get the opportunity to level up there skills to get stronger, get better, get quicker and faster. We knew that Knoxville was the perfect community for something like this,” he said.

Registration for the inaugural season of GirlPower Flag Football is officially open with early bird pricing going through July 5.

To register or to learn more about the GirlPower league, click here.