{"id":321155,"date":"2026-05-18T12:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-18T12:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/321155\/"},"modified":"2026-05-18T12:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-18T12:44:09","slug":"sacramento-footy-boosters-tout-family-friendly-nature-of-the-sport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/321155\/","title":{"rendered":"Sacramento ‘footy’ boosters tout family-friendly nature of the sport"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Abridged version:<\/p>\n

Footy is short for Australian Rules Football, and kids can give it a try with free weekend clinics in Sacramento in May and June.<\/p>\n

Some call it the mega sport of all sports. It draws more from basketball and soccer than from American football.<\/p>\n

Notoriety spiked during the 2020 pandemic, when Australian teams kept playing while most American sports went dark. It is seen as one of the most family-friendly athletic endeavors.<\/p>\n

Orangevale mom and Woodcreek High School PE teacher Jenna Taipaleti loves talking about \u2014 and playing \u2014 the \u201cmega sport of all sports.\u201d Those are her words to describe \u201cfooty,\u201d shorthand for Australian Rules Football. The\u00a0 game has been gaining popularity across the United States and, to some degree, also here in Northern California, especially among youth players.<\/p>\n

\u201cNationwide, more and more clubs are being founded throughout each season,\u201d explained Taipaleti. \u201cThe United States Australian Football League is growing in terms of numbers of players competing each season.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australian rules football is a fast-paced team sport where players score by kicking a ball similar to an American football between four goal posts. The similarities to American football, however, are few and far between.<\/p>\n

\"KidsThe Sacramento Australian Football Club hosts a youth clinic at Bryte Park in West Sacramento on May 9, 2026. (Daryl Stinchfield)<\/p>\n

\u2018Rugby\u2019s cousin\u2019<\/p>\n

Taipaleti describes it more like \u201crugby\u2019s cousin,\u201d with certain aspects also similar to basketball and soccer. Her 9-year-old son has played all of those sports as well as flag football and said footy is a favorite.<\/p>\n

According to the International Journal of Sport Communication<\/a>, the attention on footy in the United States skyrocketed during the spring of 2020. The Australian Football League \u2014 unlike just about every American sport \u2014 decided to continue playing games at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In March 2020, Google searches for Australian football in the U.S. were more popular than at any other time during the previous four years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Schools showcasing sport in PE classes<\/p>\n

Taipaleti, along with other local footy players, hopes to see the sport grow even more in the Sacramento area, especially among younger athletes. Taipaleti plays footy herself and is heavily involved in the Sacramento Australian Football Club<\/a>, known as the Sacramento Suns. Fellow parent and Suns player Kendall Hutchings has joined her to invite all interested families to try footy, including at a series of free clinics<\/a> for kids in May and June on Saturday mornings in Sacramento.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe would love to see this going from clinics to more of a league where we can \u2026 give them uniforms and have them compete more in regular season games,\u201d Taipaleti said.<\/p>\n

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Hutchings, who serves as SAFC President, said a growing number of local schools have even begun to incorporate footy into their PE classes.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur youth committee has run dozens of school clinics over the past decade at local elementary, middle and high schools,\u201d said Hutchings, of Antelope. \u201cEvery time we do, several kids emphatically enjoy the sport.\u201d Clinic organizers hand out fliers to students, but Hutchings is afraid those fliers never make it past the backpack.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hope this changes so that parents can give footy a chance,\u201d he said. \u201cAlthough I don\u2019t think footy is growing as fast in popularity in Sacramento as I\u2019d hoped or think it should, it is growing. More and more people are becoming aware of the sport.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"KidsThe Sacramento Australian Football Club hosts a youth clinic at Bryte Park in West Sacramento on May 9, 2026. (Daryl Stinchfield)<\/p>\n

Free youth clinics this summer<\/p>\n

The Suns\u2019 Saturday youth morning clinics \u2014 known as the Rising Suns \u2014 are geared toward kids ages 8 to 12. But Taipaleti said, as long as participants are at least 4 years old, parents can bring them out and sign them up on the spot. She notes that while the clinics are free, parents must first register as an official club member in order for their kids to participate, but membership is just $15.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to keep it low cost,\u201d she said. \u201cWhat I like about footy is (you can) come out and try a new sport, and you don\u2019t have to commit to an entire season. You can just try the clinics and be introduced to a new sport and the community and see how you like it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"KidsThe Sacramento Australian Football Club hosts a youth clinic at Bryte Park in West Sacramento on May 9, 2026. (Daryl Stinchfield)<\/p>\n

Both Taipaleti and Hutchings emphasize how community-oriented and family-friendly footy is.<\/p>\n

\u201cFooty connects you with Australian culture, and in Australia, parents are expected to participate in youth footy events, not just drop them off for practice as often happens in American youth sports,\u201d Hutchings said. \u201cIt\u2019s meant to be a very connected community program, run by its members for its community members, with its community members jumping in and helping as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s something for everybody,\u201d she added, explaining that the Sacramento Suns also have men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams. She also notes that club members regularly organize family outings in the greater Sacramento area \u2014 from River Cats games to pub crawls for the grownups.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a big part of health and wellness \u2014 a sense of belonging and a sense of community,\u201d Taipaleti said. \u201cFor me, coming out (to play footy) after having kids, you know when you have kids, you kind of lose that sense of self. \u2026 So not only do I get to compete in sport, but I also get the social aspect to it as well.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI found a great group of folks who strive to do good in life, and who have fun in competition,\u201d Hutchings added. \u201cWe all had in common what I like to refer to as the three C\u2019s of motivation. We like (1) competition, we like (2) contact, and we enjoy the (3) camaraderie that the SAFC provides.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"KidsThe Sacramento Australian Football Club hosts a youth clinic at Bryte Park in West Sacramento on May 9, 2026. (Daryl Stinchfield)<\/p>\n

Carolyn Becker is a regular contributor covering youth sports for Abridged in her feature Beyond the Bleachers. She\u2019s lived in Northern California most of her life and worked in journalism and communications in Sacramento for more than 25 years. She and her husband are raising two boys, both of whom play competitive baseball.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Abridged version: Footy is short for Australian Rules Football, and kids can give it a try with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":321156,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[121,123,122],"class_list":["post-321155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sacramento","tag-sacramento","tag-sacramento-headlines","tag-sacramento-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=321155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/321155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/321156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=321155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=321155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=321155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}