Submitted Photo The second season of youth flag football will begin Sept. 11 at Eisenhower.

RUSSELL — The second season of flag football for 3rd through 6th grade youth will kick off action on Sept. 11 for a four-week season at Eisenhower high school’s football field.

The brainchild of Eisenhower’s head football coach Jim Penley, the league started last fall right in the middle of COVID-19 and was highly successful, averaging over 50 players for every Saturday’s games.

“We really weren’t sure what the interest would be when we started last year, but the kids had a lot of fun playing and parents were happy to watch their kids play,” Penley said. “We wanted to start something to help give kids an opportunity to play some football, even if they weren’t playing in one of the youth leagues.”

The premise of the league is to recreate a backyard fun league.

“Our local youth leagues have done a great job for years,” Penley said, “but due to certain societal concerns fewer and fewer kids are playing tackle football, so we wanted to provide another option so that kids could just play a pickup flag football game, kind of like we used to play before organized leagues and games.”

The head coach uses his varsity players to assume the role of coaches and officials.

“They can’t wait to do it again. They really enjoy the coaching side of it,” Penley said. “I enjoy watching them step into that position and provide some leadership to the young players.”

The league is modeled after schoolyard pick-up games, with a strong emphasis on establishing balanced teams and new teams each week.

“We really just want the kids to have fun and hopefully that will create an interest to want to continue playing into junior high and varsity levels,” Penley said.

The league will run on four consecutive Saturdays finishing on Oct. 2nd. Games will begin at noon. Registration is available the day of the game.

For more information, contact Jim Penley at 814-757-8878. The school is located at 3700 Pennsylvania Route 957, Russell, PA 16345.