Raleigh, N.C. — High school sports participation in North Carolina has not recovered to pre-pandemic levels, according to data released by the National Federation of State High School Associations on Thursday.
Overall participation in North Carolina was down 9.1% during the 2021-2022 school year compared to the 2018-2019 school year, the last time the NFHS has released participation data due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The total number of participants in North Carolina dropped from 198,252 to 180,255.
Both boys and girls sports saw declines, but the largest drop was seen among girls sports. The number of girls participating in high school sports in North Carolina dropped from 87,541 in 2018-2019 to 76,612 last school year, a decline of 12.5%. Boys participation dropped from 110,711 to 103,643, a decline of 6.4%.
North Carolina ranked 12th nationally for total number of high school sports participants during the 2018-2019 school year, but the state has fallen to No. 13 as Georgia jumped to No. 12.
The NFHS has not yet released sport-specific data for individual states, but indicated that information will be released soon.
Nationally, high school sports participation declined by 4% from 2018-2019 to 2021-2022. National boys participation dropped by 3.5% and and girls participation dropped by 4.7%. North Carolina saw steeper declines in participation in both boys and girls sports, compared to the national numbers.
The NFHS believes the numbers are encouraging overall, despite the declines.
“Given what has occurred in our country the past three years, we believe a decline of only four percent in participation totals from 2018-19 is pretty remarkable,” said Dr. Karissa Niehoff, CEO of the NFHS. “We know some states that were able to complete surveys in 2020-21 reported participation increases this past year. So, we are very optimistic that trend will continue in the years to come as schools fully recover from the effects of the 2020 shutdown.”
HighSchoolOT has reached out to the N.C. High School Athletic Association for comment.
Football participation continues decline
The football participation data for North Carolina has not yet been released, but the NFHS has released the national data.
11-man football participation declined by 3.2%, dropping below 1 million participants nationally. The number of schools offering 11-man football also declined by 3.6%, down 514 schools from 14,247 in 2018-2019 to 13,733 in 2021-2022.
The NFHS points to growing participation in other forms of football as a reason for optimism though. The number of schools offering 6-man, 8-man, or 9-man football grew from 1,563 to 1,790 — and increase of 12.7%.
Girls participation in 6-man, 8-man, 9-man, and 11-man football also grew last year, up from 2,604 to 3,633 — and increase of 39.5%. Girls flag football participation also grew by 40.9% with an increase from 11,209 to 15,716 participants.
The NFHS called the football participation data “encouraging,” despite the drops in 11-man football participation.
“Certainly, the football numbers are encouraging after the previous report from the 2018-19 season,” Niehoff said. “The movement from 11-player to other versions of the game continues to be attractive to schools in some states, and the growth of girls flag football continues to gain ground in more areas of the country.”
Across all forms of football, including both boys and girls, participation declined by 2.1%, down from 1,051,047 to 1,028,976.
This is a developing story and it will be updated.
