Western New York native and longtime girls flag football coach Rudy Fish was named the inaugural head coach of Daemen University Women's Flag Football in August 2026 and will immediately begin recruiting to fill out a roster for competition beginning during the Spring 2028 semester. Daemen announced Women's Flag Football as the
17th NCAA sponsored sport offered at the institution in May.
Fish is no stranger to building a program from the ground up. As a longtime football coach at the high school level in WNY, he was among the first to adopt girls flag football, partnering with the Buffalo Bills to begin a flag football program at Cheektowaga Central Middle School in 2017 where Fish served as the head coach for five years. In the early days of flag, Fish focused on developing foundational skills and football knowledge for his middle school athletes.
In 2022, Fish moved up to the high school level, building the girls varsity flag football program from the ground up right as flag was beginning to take off both in Western New York and at the the state level. Over three years with the Warriors, Fish helped recruit student-athletes from around the school involved in other sports to build and develop a competitive team along with planning practices, game strategies and player development activities all while promoting participation and program visibility.
In 2023, he was named one of the coaches of the WNY Lions Club High School All-Star Girls Flag Football game, a game that brings graduating seniors together to play one final high school game. Fish has served as a coach in the game every summer since 2023. After seven years as a flag coach at Cheektowaga Central, Fish made the move to the West Seneca school district where he coached the girls varsity flag team in 2025 and 2026.
On top of being a high school girls flag football coach, Fish has also served as a girls travel flag football coach through WNY Flash since January 2026, recruiting, evaluating and developing athletes from around Western New York and taking his teams on the road to play against competitive competition across the state and into Canada.
Competition for Daemen women's flag football is slated to begin in the Spring of 2028.
