Women's lacrosse
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Womens_lacrosse1.jpg
Women's lacrosse is a popular version of lacrosse, a summer team sport of North American origin played with netted sticks that are used to throw a ball into the opponent's goal.
Women's lacrosse dates back to at least 1890, which it was adopted as a variation of field hockey. It differs from the better-known men's version largely because most contact is forbidden, where as in men's lacrosse, full-body contact is an essential part of the game. As a result, women players wear much less protective gear - for example, only the goalkeeper wears a helmet. Women's lacrosse also uses a more shallow pocket on the sticks, making it harder to control the ball under pressure. Additionally, starting in 2003, women playing are required to wear protective eye gear in the form of goggles to minimize eye and face injury. Moreover, women are required to wear mouthguards just like the men. Although women are not allowed to hit each other like the men players, they can still check each others' sticks, knocking the ball out.
As a result of these differences, its fans say action is more spread out and faster than in the men's version. The sport is sometimes called 'the fastest sport on two legs'.
The positions from defense to attack for women's lacrosse go from the goalkeeper to point, cover point, third man, two defense wings, one of which can be anywhere on the field and the other must stay behind the restraining line on the offensive side, two attack wings one of which goes both ways and one of which must stay behind the restraining line on the defensive side, a center where the ball begins on a draw, then on the offensive end, a third home, second home, and first home. In 2000, the restraining line was taken from the men's game and added to women's lacrosse. The objective is to score, because the team with the most goals wins.
The penalties for women's lacrosse are given in cards:
- The green card is for a delay of game.
- The yellow card is one penalty and gets the player shown it off the field for five minutes (two in high school competition).
- Two yellow cards is equal to a red card and this gets a player ejected from a game and the following game.
A common bumper sticker says "Lacrosse... Indians invented it: Woman perfected it."
See International Federation of Women's Lacrosse Associations