Akemi Higa, a sophomore at Desert Oasis High School, shattered the state record for single-season passing in girls flag football with 7,020 yards. She will be honored Monday at the Sun Standout Awards as a finalist in the category of Rising Star, which recognizes the top freshman or sophomore of any sport.
Saturday, May 18, 2024 | 2 a.m.
The Higa girls fell in love with flag football at a young age.
Maybe it was the thrill of competition and that indescribable feeling of scoring a touchdown, or maybe it was what we all love about sports in the camaraderie with teammates. Whatever the case, they were hooked.
Akemi Higa is a quarterback; twin Akiko is her favorite wide receiver. And they are dominating, leading Desert Oasis High this winter to the state semifinals and rewriting the state record book.
Akemi Higa, a sophomore, shattered the Nevada mark for single-season passing yards with 7,020. She will be honored Monday at the Sun Standout Awards as a finalist in the category of Rising Star, the top freshman or sophomore of any sport. The event takes place at the South Point Showroom.
The Sun’s annual awards show is modeled after ESPN’s ESPY Awards in honoring the top players, games and moments of the past prep season.
If the twins were still living in Hawaii, they would no longer be playing because flag football isn’t offered for teens in their native Oahu.
The girls and some friends from the islands got a team together for a tournament in California about three years ago. They were masterly that weekend, even attracting attention from Jen Welter, the first woman to be on an NFL coaching staff.
They detailed for her the lack of opportunities for girls in Hawaii. Welter told them to move to Las Vegas, where the sport was enjoying a meteoric rise in popularity. The Clark County School District in 2012 launched one of the first high school flag football leagues nationally for girls, and participation has skyrocketed.
So, they moved to Las Vegas. And not just anywhere in town, handpicking the Desert Oasis High School zone. The Diamondbacks have one of the best flag programs.
The girls fit in perfectly, including Akiko Higa posting 2,569 receiving yards and 48 touchdowns this winter. She’s not up for an award at the show.
“Why get good at something if you have no future at it?,” Akemi Higa said. “On our island we have no future.”
Here in Las Vegas, the future is bright.
That’s because when the high school season ends, the club season takes over to give girls a circuit to continue developing. It’s become a year-round activity.
And with the Raiders heavily involved in youth football, there’s a handful of annual events at the NFL team’s Henderson facility to give the girls another platform to live out their football aspirations.
“I’m a little amazed,” Akemi Higa said. “I didn’t think I’d be this successful in the sport I love or get this kind of recognition. It’s cool to see everyone mentioning my name.”
Girls simply want equal opportunities to compete as their male counterparts. Our Las Vegas youth sports community should be proud of how flag football has blossomed into that chance.
Desert Oasis coach Todd Thompson said his program had 75 girls over three levels of teams. Unfortunately, he must cut about 50 girls per season, often referring them to the basketball program.
Before flag football’s emergence, you’d find a girl who loved football so much that she’d join the boys tackle team. That’s what the Higa twins attempted to do in Hawaii.
“There’s no need to do that now,” Thompson said. “There was a time when it was, ‘Look how cool it is that she’s playing football with the boys.’ But you have your own sport to play now, and that sport gives you an avenue to college and the Olympics. You don’t need to be plowed over by some 300-pound kid.”
A handful of NAIA schools are offering flag football and awarding full scholarships, giving players like the twins another level to strive to reach.
Akemi Higa might go one step further. She’s part of the under-17 U.S. national team and could find herself under center participating in 2028 in Los Angeles, when flag football will debut as an Olympic sport.
“She’s a natural quarterback,” Thompson said. “She throws the ball better than a lot of the boys I have coached over the years. Outside of that, her demeanor is just level. If you can create the perfect brain for a quarterback, it would be her. When a drive ends, you don’t know if we scored a touchdown or if she threw a pick-6, because she is the same.”
Akemi Higa isn’t the lone representative from the flag football community who was pegged as a finalist for the Sun Standout Awards.
Shadow Ridge High, which surrendered just 16 points in three playoff games while winning a third consecutive state championship, is a finalist for Team of the Year. Coach Matt Nighswonger is a finalist for Coach of the Year.
Nighswonger deserves much of the credit for helping the game reach new heights. He’s the president of the local coaches association and works behind the scenes coordinating offseason leagues.
“I have been pleasantly surprised with how (the game) has exploded,” he said.
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