Bills Mafia is recruiting in Niagara

This weekend the Buffalo Bills invaded Canada again.

A day before their team’s tough loss to the Houston Texans, the Bills entourage was at Kiwanis Field in St. Catharines hosting a free flag football clinic hosted by the Niagara Regional Minor Football Association.

“It’s our fourth year of bringing the bills to the table and we’re hosting their skills and drills camp,” said NRMFA board member Jim Storin.

More than 150 children ages 8 to 13 participated in the clinic with eight skills stations that focused on every element of playing flag football, including pulling the flag, quarterback, running back, wide receiver, defensive back, defensive line and stair exercises. .

Participants included players from Niagara Regional Flag Football and other organizations.

“Flag football is one of the fastest growing sports in the world, especially as it will take place at the next Olympic Games. It is important for us to do this clinic because we want to give back to our community,” said Storin. . “As a nonprofit, we started a tackle league in 1999, then COVID hit and we really had to change how we think and how we approach things. We started with flag football and have seen it continuously grow. By doing this partnership with the Bills, where we can bring kids in for free and teach them a non-contact sport, it helps them, it helps us and, most importantly, it helps the kids.

This year, the NRMFA hosted a spring flag football program in Grimsby, St. Catharines and Niagara Falls and a fall competition in St. Catharines.

“We try to play two competitions every year and we’re going to try to grow through the winter, possibly do something at Sinnicks this winter for older kids and maybe even adults,” he said. “We don’t want to look too far ahead, but it is something that our board is looking at. We’re trying to grow it a bit and see if we can make it work.

The association had more than 600 children playing in the spring league and just under 300 children participating in the fall league. The NRMFA started flag football programming in the fall of 2021 and had 104 children registered.

It was a great year for both flag and tackle football for the NRMFA. It reintroduced its spring varsity tackle league and had more than 250 players.

“We had a few board members who took charge of that, worked with high school coaches and made it very successful,” Storin said.

He is a fan of tackle but believes flag is the future of football.

“As much as I love the game, tackling is a dying sport. This is the future because you’re going to attract kids who don’t even think about equipment. They will love it and take the next step.”

The Bills’ Saturday clinic was their first cross-border visit of 2024.

“We hope to make trips every quarter because this is a big part of our market for the Buffalo Bills,” said Preston Teague, senior director of youth football and programs for the Buffalo Bills. “The more we can do here to grow the game the better and we are excited every time we come here. The kids are great, the coaches are great and we had a great day here. It was a great day of football.”

Clinic participants learned a host of skills and took home some Bills swag, including T-shirts, gift bags, rally towels, yearbooks and wristbands.

“This is a big part of our market and we have a lot of fans in Southern Ontario and the Niagara region,” Teague said. “We’re excited to come here, give back, help the game grow and hopefully bring some kids and families to join the Bills Mafia.”