For 3 years I have wanted to play a team sport in high school, the problem was that the schools I went to didn’t offer sports. I am interested in playing football at the California Community College I will be attending in the Fall. Can I make the team if I haven’t played before?
You might if you have a special skill - kicking, punting, fast as lightening receiver. It depends on your athletic ability, but realistically, you don’t have a very good chance. It is pretty hard to jump into a team sport if you have no experience with any team sport. We have some players on my daughter’s lax team who had never played before, but they were all soccer players so used to running the field, and they mostly played defense. They just don’t have the stick skills the others have developed by playing for 10 years. They were invited to the team because it was a new team and we needed the numbers. All but on have graduated, and even the one is no longer a starter because the coach has recruited players who are just better. She still plays, still enjoys it, but it was a special situation that allowed her to start a new sport so late.
It is unlikely they will even let you try, assuming the CC you will be attending is the type of school where kids who are hunting scholarships but for one reason or another (grades, injury, discipline issues) don’t get the offers out of high school end up. Often the level of play at those schools is very high, usually similar to good D2 ball.
I don’t know of too many schools outside of D3 (and even there it is becoming rare among the better programs) which offer open tryouts anymore, and even those that do will have you go through a pretty thurough physical check before getting on the field.
I know a few people who have done it, but they were established athletes in other sports, e.g. one guy who was already on the college baseball team and decided to give football a try too. And there is a once in a blue moon case like Nate Ebner, who walked on at Ohio State his junior year and is now in the NFL, But he was on the US national rugby team before football i.e. a superior athlete in a somewhat similar sport.
But as noted above, I think the odds are not great.