It took most of the season for the Newburgh Free Academy flag football team to get its first win last season.

This season is already shaping up differently as the Goldbacks routed the newly formed Our Lady of Lourdes Warriors, 52-0, on Thursday at Academy Field.

“I think we put in a lot of hard work,” said Mckayla Rafferty, one of the Goldbacks’ four team captains. “We definitely had an early season this year, as far as last year. I think it definitely helped us with the couple of weeks we had to prepare.”

No one was readier for the season opener than eighth-grader Kallie McCoy, who got the Goldbacks on the board with a 70-yard run and finished with three touchdowns.

She might have had a fourth touchdown if she hadn’t been pulled from the game due to the high point differential.

On the defensive side of the football, she picked off a pass and ran it back for a touchdown. In the second half, she returned a punt about 40 yards for a touchdown.

“It felt good,” McCoy said. “I played more positions than last year, and it’s a better chemistry with everybody else.”

Fellow team captain and quarterback Megan Evans was involved with three touchdowns. She completed two touchdown passes to tight end Emily Mitchell. The first was for 1 yard and the second was for 22.

She also ran for a three-yard touchdown in the second half. She also completed a touchdown pass to Lindsay Dando and a conversion pass to Rafferty.

“This gives us motivation for the rest of our games,” Evans said. “We start with our heads high.”

Katie Bell, who was a member of the girls’ lacrosse team last year, joined the flag football program this year. She ran for an extra-point conversion in the second half.

“I just came out to play and play hard,” Bell said. “We all played really hard today. Obviously, it shows on the scoreboard. We’re all learning new things. We all made mistakes, but we had more success than failure.”

Janiya Coleman capped off the scoring, returning an interception for a touchdown late in the second half.

“I feel like it’s a brand-new sport,” Rafferty said. “We just faced a team that didn’t have a season last year, so we’re very fortunate to have a lot of returners and a lot of team connections.”

But just because they played last year, the Goldbacks had to navigate some changes this year, as new rules were added, such as punt returns.

This year, the receiving team may advance the football if they catch the ball. The play is dead if the ball hits the ground or goes out of bounds.

“A whole bunch of different rules that we added like punt returns,” Evans said. “That makes a huge difference.”

And, the officials were very lenient on Thursday, helping the Warriors navigate through their first game, and the Goldbacks navigate the new rules.

“They were being more lenient because Lourdes is a new team,” Evans said.
Making the win even sweeter was that everyone got into the game.

“We weren’t expecting to get everyone in,” Evans said. “but it was helpful that our score was high so people could learn because we have three or four brand new people.”

The Goldbacks finished the week with a 12-6 win over the Valley Central Vikings on Saturday at Academy Field.