March 20 would turn out to be a historic day for New Rochelle High School, as McKenna Field played home the first-year varsity flag football team’s program opening game. Fortunately for the Huguenots, they day would also see New Rochelle’s first win, as the hosts topped Carmel 19-7.
The Rams got on the board first, marching down the field and taking a 7-0 lead on New Rochelle just a few minutes into the first half. But the Huguenots responded right away as quarterback Jocelyn Hernandez hit Brianne Foley for a long touchdown pass to put her team on the board. Hernandez and Foley would connect for another touchdown later in the half and the Huguenots would get their final score of the day from Stella Ziogas.
Hernandez said that the first touchdown helped the Huguenots settle into the game for what would be a dominant stretch.
“That first touchdown just gave us more confidence,” said Hernandez. “I think we played better after that.”
New Rochelle is one of the latest Section 1 schools to field a flag football team. Flag football was formally introduced as a varsity sport by New York State last year and Section 1 now boasts 26 competing team—up 10 from a year ago.
“We heard our athletic director start to talk about this in the beginning of the year,” said Foley, a senior. “So a few of us decided we really needed to get this done and were really pushing for this to become a sport here.”
Foley said that finally getting a chance to take the field was a special moment and that the Huguenots and their coaches have been working hard to pick up—what is for many—a brand new sport in the matter of a few weeks.
“I think it really woke the team up when Carmel got their first touchdown because nobody wanted to come out and lose our first fame,” she said. “It took a bit of practice to get us all knowing what we were doing, but I think you could see everyone knew where they fit in today.”
Now, with their first win in the books, the Huguenots will look to continue their inspired play in a week that sees them taking on Brewster, John Jay, and Ossining in the span of five days.
“I think we all feel a lot better now that we got the first win out of the way,” said Foley. “We’re playing a really tough team on Friday and we know that’s going to be a hard game, but we’ll be heading in with some more confidence because of today.”
