May 2, 2025
Most folks who have suffered severe concussions from blows to the head would do what they can to prevent another.
If it means wearing a helmet, bring on the equipment.
Even groups that were long in denial about the consequences of head injuries, like the National Football League, have added extra protection to protect players’ heads.
Girls’ lacrosse, though, is holding out, providing its players with goggles but no other head protection, even as girls’ lacrosse players suffer concussions at a rate higher than children playing football, according to one study. That study showed that more than one of every five injuries to a girl playing lacrosse is a concussion.
Despite shockingly high concussion rates, and the fact that girls’ lacrosse is the fast-growing team sport in the United States, helmets remain optional on local playing fields. Only Florida mandates helmets in girls’ lacrosse.
That’s a problem that can and must be addressed.
The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA) allows for the use of helmets in girls’ lacrosse but does not mandate it.
The rules are different for boys. They must wear helmets with chinstraps. The rule is so strict that if a player’s helmet comes off during a game, play is stopped.
To be sure, girls’ and boys’ lacrosse are not the same game. Girls play a non-contact variation of the sport, where body checking is not allowed, nor can a player intentionally enter into the path of a shot on goal.
Still, girls are often concussed by errant tosses of balls that are as hard as baseballs. And while girls cannot use their bodies to check, they run and defend with long and hard sticks that can unintentionally strike another player in the head.
The toll of head injuries on players is beginning to get local players and coaches talking about rule changes.
Andrew MacDougall, the varsity girls’ lacrosse coach at Amherst Regional High School, said three players on the junior varsity team suffered concussions this year.
MacDougall and other western Massachusetts high school coaches say they would prefer the sport mandate helmet use, even if it means that girls’ lacrosse might become a little rougher as a consequence. “It just seems like it’s a no-brainer,” MacDougall said.
The resistance to having the girls wear helmets comes down to habit. Girls’ lacrosse was designed in the 1930s to be a non-contact sport.
But the rising concussion rate says this sport is changing. What do the sport’s leaders truly value – the brain safety of its current players or tradition?