Any chance girls lax will begin wearing helmets?

[Anonymous]

Helmets have been optional for several years now and haven't been heavily adopted by girls. Not hard to figure out why -- they don't want to wear them and don't feel the need to wear them. The good news is girls have been given the option to wear helmets by USL. Parents and players can exercise their option to wear a helmet. No need to push an agenda on others when clearly the majority don't feel there is a need. We wan't to grow the game, not send it into a tailspin by forcing girls to wear helmets when they don't feel it's necessary. Better training for officials and consistent enforcement of the rules will have the biggest impact on safety.

[Anonymous]

How about just unify the game and remove the difference between the two sports that only share a name and a size/weight of the ball? I've been around girls lacrosse for a long time and I think many players would much rather play the same game as the guys. The US Women's Hockey team showed that women can absolutely play a physical game just like the guys. I don't know about you but violations like "shooting space" which are there for safety are counter to what kids learn in EVERY other sport. In every other sport where there is a ball and a goal you are taught to put yourself between the ball and the goal/net. Shooting space breaks that quickly and rightly so because girls are unprotected. The 8 meter shot is such a gift that teams actually run plays with no intention to shoot but just to draw the shooting space violation. Other rules that are there to protect the player could be done away with altogether. If you've seen the study https://injepijournal.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s40621-015-0045-4 you can see that womens lacrosse is the #2 sport in terms of concussions (behind football), however the incidence for goalies is the lowest. At the same time the incidence for goalies in soccer are the highest amongst soccer teams. It's only been a few years since they stopped penalizing a goalie for shooting space violations when they are fully padded up. Is there a reason why girls and guys can't play the exact same game? I am actually surprised that this hasn't become a politicized issue.

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How about just unify the game and remove the difference between the two sports that only share a name and a size/weight of the ball? I've been around girls lacrosse for a long time and I think many players would much rather play the same game as the guys. The US Women's Hockey team showed that women can absolutely play a physical game just like the guys. I don't know about you but violations like "shooting space" which are there for safety are counter to what kids learn in EVERY other sport. In every other sport where there is a ball and a goal you are taught to put yourself between the ball and the goal/net. Shooting space breaks that quickly and rightly so because girls are unprotected. The 8 meter shot is such a gift that teams actually run plays with no intention to shoot but just to draw the shooting space violation. Other rules that are there to protect the player could be done away with altogether. If you've seen the study https://injepijournal.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s40621-015-0045-4 you can see that womens lacrosse is the #2 sport in terms of concussions (behind football), however the incidence for goalies is the lowest. At the same time the incidence for goalies in soccer are the highest amongst soccer teams. It's only been a few years since they stopped penalizing a goalie for shooting space violations when they are fully padded up. Is there a reason why girls and guys can't play the exact same game? I am actually surprised that this hasn't become a politicized issue.

Thoughts?

You make some good points - back the day it was explained to me that the rules protected the women in lacrosse, helmets/pads protected the men. And yes, the safe shooting space rule is so messed up compared to other sports - maybe they should make the goal smaller because of all the advantage it gives the shooter. I expect you'll hear the roar of complaints that parents don't want their kids to play w/ helmets, equiptment, etc but it appears that rules are no longer protecting them and the game needs to evolve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about just unify the game and remove the difference between the two sports that only share a name and a size/weight of the ball? I've been around girls lacrosse for a long time and I think many players would much rather play the same game as the guys. The US Women's Hockey team showed that women can absolutely play a physical game just like the guys. I don't know about you but violations like "shooting space" which are there for safety are counter to what kids learn in EVERY other sport. In every other sport where there is a ball and a goal you are taught to put yourself between the ball and the goal/net. Shooting space breaks that quickly and rightly so because girls are unprotected. The 8 meter shot is such a gift that teams actually run plays with no intention to shoot but just to draw the shooting space violation. Other rules that are there to protect the player could be done away with altogether. If you've seen the study https://injepijournal.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s40621-015-0045-4 you can see that womens lacrosse is the #2 sport in terms of concussions (behind football), however the incidence for goalies is the lowest. At the same time the incidence for goalies in soccer are the highest amongst soccer teams. It's only been a few years since they stopped penalizing a goalie for shooting space violations when they are fully padded up. Is there a reason why girls and guys can't play the exact same game? I am actually surprised that this hasn't become a politicized issue.

Thoughts?

You make some good points - back the day it was explained to me that the rules protected the women in lacrosse, helmets/pads protected the men. And yes, the safe shooting space rule is so messed up compared to other sports - maybe they should make the goal smaller because of all the advantage it gives the shooter. I expect you'll hear the roar of complaints that parents don't want their kids to play w/ helmets, equiptment, etc but it appears that rules are no longer protecting them and the game needs to evolve.

Agree completely. It's time for the game to evolve to protect our girls.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. Helmets won't change the behavior causing the concern. Enforcement of rules will.

Well, you can work on that while my kids wearing a helmet.

Lets welcome the mother of the 3rd grader with the false sense of security to the conversation. Let us know how the helmet works out when she gets a nice swinging check to the face and a broken nose. We don't want to hear any complaints from you when it happens or yelling at the refs for dirty play you didn't want to discourage. Remember, you are the one who chose helmets over rules enforcement. May be better to join the conversation when you have a few years under your belt.

Not PP, you’re missing the point. Kids can wear helmets AND m refs can call games tighter. And there’s no chance of breaking a nose swinging against facemask - try on a helmet some time.

Right now, refs make fewer calls when the player being checked is wearing a helmet. Girls wearing a helmet also tend to be more aggressive than those not wearing helmets.

-parent of a high school age player.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree. Helmets won't change the behavior causing the concern. Enforcement of rules will.

Well, you can work on that while my kids wearing a helmet.

Lets welcome the mother of the 3rd grader with the false sense of security to the conversation. Let us know how the helmet works out when she gets a nice swinging check to the face and a broken nose. We don't want to hear any complaints from you when it happens or yelling at the refs for dirty play you didn't want to discourage. Remember, you are the one who chose helmets over rules enforcement. May be better to join the conversation when you have a few years under your belt.

Not PP, you’re missing the point. Kids can wear helmets AND m refs can call games tighter. And there’s no chance of breaking a nose swinging against facemask - try on a helmet some time.

Right now, refs make fewer calls when the player being checked is wearing a helmet. Girls wearing a helmet also tend to be more aggressive than those not wearing helmets.

-parent of a high school age player.

When I was in high school playing boys lacrosse w/ a helmet, they would call a penalty if the stick even touched the helmet during freshman/sophomore games. For varsity, they would allow glancing contact known as a brush w/o penalty. Sounds like parents/coaches should reach out to the Washington ref organization to clarify and/reinforce what's going to be called.

[Anonymous]

Maybe the HS girls wearing helmets seem aggressive because they’re just genetically superior. They obviously come from smarter more evolved parents, so it’s possible.