Kyle Goon: Taulia Tagovailoa set records for the Terps. His next dream? Going to the Olympics.

Throughout his career, Taulia Tagovailoa has proven he will go anywhere to chase his football dreams. But even by that standard, his latest venture cast him wildly far afield.

Just a few weeks ago, the 26-year-old quarterback had followed his passion to Germany, playing flag football for a country he has never visited against a team that almost never loses.

While Tagovailoa has played for many teams in many leagues, he only picked up the flag version of the sport earlier this summer. Then on Aug. 14, he was starting in the Flag Football World Championships for American Samoa — the lowest-ranked team in the tournament.

But hey, Tagovailoa played football for the Terps — he’s never intimidated by even the steepest of odds. The night before American Samoa played Team USA, the world’s top-ranked team, coach Sterling Carvalho remembered noticing how calm his quarterback seemed after reviewing film.

“That’s honestly why we brought him to this team,” Carvalho said. “We know his experience, we know his composure in big games. When it comes to football, he’s been there, done that.”

In a game where American Samoa was supposed to be crushed, Tagovailoa dazzled. He threw five touchdowns and completed 29 of 36 passes, leading the Samoans to a 38-32 victory that upset the balance of power in the emerging sport. The U.S. team (which went on to win the tournament) had not lost a match in 14 years.

American Samoa would go on to finish in 5th place, a respectable finish for a team representing a nation of 45,000 people playing in just its second international tournament. That success has flickered into a new goal for Tagovailoa and his teammates, something they would not have dreamed possible before this summer: They have a shot at becoming Olympians at Los Angeles in 2028.

“Before this year, I didn’t know the magnitude of this whole flag football thing,” Tagovailoa said in an interview last week. “It didn’t really hit me until we got to Dusseldorf: I could be an Olympian.”

Football dreams have always loomed large in the Tagovailoa family. Taulia’s older brother Tua was a star at Alabama before establishing himself in the NFL with the Miami Dolphins (he now plays for Atlanta). Taulia’s father Galu, who immigrated from American Samoa as a teenager, is a quarterback coach who is deeply involved with the Polynesian Bowl, a high school all-star game that’s held in Hawaii. Galu helped convince Carvalho to coach an American Samoan flag football team, made largely of American citizens with Samoan ethnic roots.

Since leaving Maryland with the Big Ten’s career passing yards record, Taulia bounced through several pro leagues, including the Canadian Football League, the Indoor Football League and earlier this year, the United Football League, which plays in the spring.

As the UFL season was ending, Galu pitched his son on becoming American Samoa’s quarterback for flag football. Taulia had never played non-contact football before, but figured it would be a good way to keep his arm sharp.

The geometry and rules of the game, however, are dramatically different than conventional tackle football. It’s easier for quarterbacks and receivers because defensive backs can’t lay hands on them to disrupt passes. But the field is more narrow, raising the risk that almost every throw can arrive a split-second too late — or worse, get picked off.

“Windows can close tight,” Taulia said. “It’s definitely an offensive game for sure, but the timing and anticipating throws is very important.”

It is a game so dramatically different from conventional football that its rules feel foreign to even the best pros. The U.S. team that was toppled by American Samoa handily beat two squads stacked with NFL greats back in March.

But while Tagovailoa was largely passed over by NFL teams because of his arm strength, the skillset required in flag football played to his abilities. “The game kind of fits him,” Carvalho said.

Over the course of a handful of practices spread out in Los Angeles area this summer, he quickly developed timing and rhythm with his Samoan receivers. Choice routes — in which receivers pick their path based on the coverage — are the core piece of the Samoan offense, and the reason why the man-coverage oriented Americans struggled to cover them head-to-head.

But the team also believes off-field bonds have helped them develop stronger chemistry. When the team arrived in L.A., Tagovailoa’s first purchase was a guitar. He led post-practice song sessions that accompanied team barbeques.

“We’re bouncing around, doing two a day practices with film in between,” Carvalho said. “Then afterward, he’s there with his guitar, playing music for the boys like a perfect jukebox.”

Being a part of the Samoan team has elicited Polynesian pride for its members. Tagovailoa, who has yet to visit American Samoa some 2,600 miles from his native Hawaii, repeatedly called it “our country” over the course of our discussion. The Pacific island nation has produced a few dozen Olympians since 1988, but has yet to win an Olympic medal.

The American Samoans were just two spots shy of an automatic Olympic bid at Worlds, so they have a longer path to make the Games. They’ll have to finish top two against other Pacific countries this fall in a regional tournament, then finish top three in another worldwide tournament. L.A. 2028 will be flag football’s Olympic debut.

The biggest challenge will be that no opponent will be caught off-guard by the Samoans anymore. “We’re gonna get everyone’s best now,” Carvalho said. “Everyone’s gonna be ready for American Samoa.”

For Tagovailoa, his entry into flag football initially felt like a carefree experiment. Now it’s a mission. He is training in Alabama, settling into life with an infant son, but keeping his eye on getting to the Olympics.

He’s practicing flag-football specific drills (“I gotta get better at duck walks,” he said) and talking to his receivers. While so much of his career is “been there, done that,” what drives him is achieving something in the sport that no one has ever done before.

“I’m super grateful for my dad asking me — I think it’s divine appointment,” he said. “I can focus on this, really get into it with the ins and outs, and the rules, and just continue to grow into this flag football thing, and put our country on an international stage.”