California high school sports participation reaches all-time high
The California Interscholastic Federation has had a challenging few months, but the organization received some good news on Monday.
According to CIF’s latest Sports Participation Survey, 821,596 student-athletes participated in high school sports last school year, surpassing the previous all-time record of 815,313 set in 2019-20.
From 2023-24 to 2024-25, participation increased 1.8% overall, the survey said.
Girls participation made the biggest leap, going up by 3.1% from 349,169 athletes to 360,065. Boys participation had a smaller increase, rising 0.8% from 457,810 to 461,521.
“With more than 821,000 student-athletes participating in education-based athletics in California, it’s clear that the value of high school sports is stronger than ever,” CIF Executive Director Ron Nocetti said in a release. “The surge in girls’ flag football participation is particularly inspiring and reflects our commitment to expanding opportunities for all students to belong, connect, and compete through education-based programs.”
By far, girls flag football posted the largest increase for any individual sport, rising 84% in its second year as a CIF-sanctioned sport, leaping from 10,832 participants to 19,921. Flag football is now the seventh-most popular sport for high school girls in California, trailing soccer (47,918); volleyball (46,716); track and field (45,652); softball (29,672); basketball (28,544) and swimming and diving (20,934).
Football remained far and away the most popular sport on the boys side, pulling in 91,411 participants, which was a 1.9% increase from the 89,667 who played in 2023-24. Other sports in the top five for boys included track and field (58,457), which saw its participation numbers go up 2.4%, soccer (56,884); basketball (46,402) and baseball (42,972).
Baseball and basketball were the only top five sports to see their overall numbers go down, though they were only modest decreases. Baseball dropped from 43,051 to 42,972, while basketball fell from 46,883 to 46,402.