Most opposite-gender sports, like girls’ and boys’ soccer, are almost the same sport with the same rules. That’s the case with boys’ and girls’ tennis or boys’ and girls’ track. But a sport that differs drastically from this category is boys’ and girls’ lacrosse.
As if they are almost complete opposites, a big difference between the two teams is the equipment and how it can affect their playing styles. Captain of the girls’ lacrosse team, Junior Hannah Alexander, explains the difference in equipment between the girls’ and boys’ lacrosse teams.
“Girls only have goggles and their sticks; the boys have their helmets, chest pads, elbow pads, and gloves,” Alexander said. “We girls don´t even have gloves.”
Not only is the equipment different for lacrosse, but so are the rules.
Senior Chayton Peck says that for girls’ lacrosse, “You can´t hit anywhere except the stick, and even that [hit] has to be light,” Peck said.
Since their rules differ, the strategy between the two versions ends up differing as well.
“In [boys] lacrosse, you have to use physicality like body checks,” sophomore Lucian Sukdeo said, [ButDf] in girls’ lacrosse, you can’t even throw a check, and there’s so much technicality. Girls have to control their sticks, much better than boys, because the pocket in their stick is so shallow, whereas for the boys it’s deep.”
Not only are there physical differences, such as gear between the boys and girls teams, but so is the team dynamics.
“Some of the boys get in their own heads [throwing off their game], whereas the girls’ team is powered by the whole team, like we feed [into] each other,” Alexander said.
Meanwhile, “[On the boys team, there’s] a lot of joking around, and not taking things personally,” Peck said.
While the team could seem like opposites, they can also seem similar to one another. For example, both seem not sponsored by the OSAA nor funded by the school. Both teams are trying their hardest to get the school to fund their team, especially since they have to pay for things such as gear for themselves.
Sukhdeo claims that the lacrosse team on both sides believes they should be funded as a school sport. Sukhdeo said ¨[Both the boys and girls team] have been fighting to become a [school-funded] sport… The school isn’t recognising us as much, and all the equipment and the new jerseys we just bought were fundraised. Everything has to be fundraised.”
Even though the teams seem to have their differences, they both have the same end goal: they just want to enjoy playing the sport they love.
