- The 80-year-old Pop Warner youth football organization has a Super Bowl for several age groups each December in Florida.
- The NFL has a national 7-on-7 touch football national tournament in July.
- This summer marks the debut of an international youth football tournament in Ohio.
If your child is anxious to light up the football scoreboards, these may be something they would be interested in.
Pop Warner Little Scholars
Founded in 1929 as an antidote to juvenile delinquency in the Philadelphia area, the Pop Warner football organization today serves more than 150,000 young people. It adopted its current name, Pop Warner Little Scholars, in 1959. Cheerleading programs were added in the 1970s, and flag football in the 1980s. There are nine divisions for football, sorted by ages and weights.
Each year December, a Pop Warner championship tournament is held in Florida at the Disney Wide World of Sports complex in East Lakeland. The tournament is called the Pop Warner Super Bowl. It lasts one week and features four divisions with ages ranging from 8 to 15. The divisions are called Junior Peewee, Peewee, Junior Midget, and Midget. To be eligible to participate, a team must win a regional championship. A total of 64 teams participate across the four divisions. Cheerleading and dancing competitions are also included in the week’s festivities.
Football teams must have their players weighed in at the tournament to make sure they fall within the required weight ranges. Study halls are included so that players can make up schoolwork that they miss during the tournament. The championship games are broadcast over the ESPN 360 network. Teams from Mexico and Japan are allowed to compete if they win a regional championship.
NFL 7-on-7 Tournament
The National Football League established the NFL High School Player Development program to provide character development and football skills training for grades 10-12. The character development program consists of teaching participants how to get acceptable grades, how to prepare for standardized tests, and how to learn to live independently. The football training teaches players skills for their particular offensive or defensive positions.
As part of this program, the NFL holds a national touch football competition for seven-player teams. Only players who have completed the character development program are eligible to compete. The format is non-contact with no blocking and no running plays. Regional tournaments are held in areas that have NFL teams. The national championship is a two-day event held in July in an NFL city. It begins with round-robin play and then moves to a single-elimination finale.
International Tournament
In 2008, the International Federation of American Football (IFAF) announced that eight nations would compete in a world championship of high school football June 27 – July 5, 2009. Among the participants are the United States and Canada. Also competing will be Germany, which won a European qualifying tournament, along with Sweden and France, which finished second and third. Japan will compete as well, plus representatives from Latin America and Oceania.
The tournament will be held in Canton, Ohio, the home of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The competition’s official name is the IFAF 2009 Junior World Championship.
Pop Warner football leagues are the best way to teach your son some serious sportsmanship. They have always been really good organizations and its great to see them doing these little scholar leagues.
P.S. – Uh, the picture you have up there is soccer, not football. 😀
I’m surprised that there hasn’t been a league in Ohio prior to this since it is the home of the Football Hall of Fame. Kudos to the organizers for promoting sports and football.
I remember playing Pop Warner football as I kid. We didn’t have anything as fun as these leagues but my son is one of the lucky ones who gets to attend the IFAF tournament. It should be a lot of fun.