Hamilton-Wenham Girls Youth Lacrosse Information
Spring 2021
HWGYL is affiliated with the Founders Girls Lacrosse League (FGLL). The official season is April - mid June. Every age group will practice twice a week. Games are on Sundays against local towns, times will vary each week. Select games are on Friday nights. Pending field conditions, outdoor practices will start at the end of March. Indoor practices are an unkown at this point and will be revisited in the beginning of March.
Hamilton-Wenham will have travel teams available for grades 1st-8th. Select team tryouts for grades 5th/6th and 7th/8th combined with Ipswich. If anyone would like their child to participate in practices only, not games, please contact Wes (mcculloughw@gmail.com).
Registration:
Registration is open for all girls age groups from 12/7/20 - 2/28/2021
There is no initial registration fee being charged. After Feb 28th, we will reconcile any rollover amounts from 2020 season with fees for this season and notify families of amount owed.
Please notify Wes (mcculloughw@gmail.com) by Feb 28th if you have registered your child and they no longer are able to play.
To register, create an account or log into your account on HWLAX.org and select Registration from Home menu or left nav menu. Note you must first log into hwlax.org to see the Registration menu.
Grades/Ages:
FGLL assigns teams based on school grade. All HWYGL programs are travel teams to nearby towns:
U9 (Grade 1 & 2)
U11 (Grades 3 & 4)
U13 (Grades 5 & 6)
U15 (Grades 7 & 8)
Fees:
A non-refundable fee of $160/180 is required for participation in U9, U11, U13, U15 programs.
The HWYGL fee includes:
- A $10 per player payment to HW Recreation for maintenance and use of fields
- A $30 fee payable to FGLL for insurance coverage and training.
- Field fees at Pingree School
- Referee fees for each game
- Goalie gear, training equipment, goals and balls
- Field lining
- Indoor training time
- Coaches training / certifications
No child will be denied participation for financial reasons. Please email Wes (mcculloughw@gmail.com) for more information.
Uniforms:
If your uniform from last year still fits you can wear that. If it does not fit or you are new to the program you will need to order a new uniform.
Equipment:
Your child will need:
• goggles from US Lacrosse approved eyewear list
• a colored mouth guard (extras are good) - NOT white or clear
• a uniform
• cleats or turf shoes are recommended, but not required
• a girls lacrosse stick (Lacrosse Unlimited and Dick's are good stores for stick sizing or stringing)
Select Teams:
Hamilton-Wenham spring 2021 select season will be a combined program with Ipswich. This is helpful to all towns due to lower registration numbers and the challenge of getting field space this spring. Depending on the number of interested players, try-outs will be offered for a combined 5th/6th and 7th/8th team. Select practices will be on Monday nights, in either Ipswich or Pingree School. Select games will be scheduled for Friday nights. If you are on a select team, you can only participate in games if you attend both select and travel practice and Sunday travel games.
Return to Play:
We will post our return to play guidelines / protocols here closer to the start of the season. These protocols will be in accordance with FGLL, local board of health, US Lacrosse and local field restrictions. At a mimimum, masks will be worn at all times, equipment will not be shared (except for goalie sticks, which we will clean and should not be touched except with gloved hands only) and players will have water breaks at appropriate distancing.
We are lucky to play lacrosse outside in the fresh air on a big field. However, similar to soccer or basketball it is a sport where you are often close to other players, whether going for a ground ball or playing defense. We will follow all guidelines to keep players safe. If you would like your child to practice but have concerns about playing other towns, please email Wes (mcculloughw@gmail.com).
Goalies
Goalies play in the games at every age group (U9 is optional goalie). Girls often don’t want to play goalie and it is understandable as it can be scary to have a ball thrown at you. We let girls volunteer for goalie and if no one volunteers, we will ask players to play a half in goal, with the plan to have every player take a turn. It is important for girls to take a turn playing goalie as they get a better appreciation and understanding of how important defense is and how defense needs to be played with a 100% effort. Girls are fully padded with helmets on. As girls get older, some show a real liking to playing goal and this is something to be encouraged. Goalie is an incredibly skilled spot on the field and takes tremendous hand-eye coordination. Skilled goalies are incredibly sought out at all levels of lacrosse, much more so than other positions on the field. IF your daughter enoys playing goalie and wants goalie specific practice please let your coach know so we can plan practice time accordingly and / or refer you to local clubs for specific goalie training.
Lacrosse Commitment
Lacrosse is a hard sport to learn. It requires a lot of hand-eye coordination and a lot of practice to master the skills needed to be successful on the field. Lacrosse rules are also modified to keep the game safe at the younger levels. Meaning, girls cannot ‘check’ sticks at the younger levels and only modified checking is allowed at the older levels. Because of this, games are often very high scoring as girls can run freely with the ball. We stress strong person to person defense at the younger ages. The game changes tremendously as the girls get older, especially in the high school years and gets really fun and fast. We know that these girls are all very busy and we want them to learn and love this fun game, but they need to show up to practices and games in order to really understand both the complicated rules and to get in the repetitions needed to master the skills. We can’t help them improve if they don’t show up. Unless your daughter plays club, this is the only season for lacrosse and we ask that as a family, you try to make a commitment to this spring season of lacrosse.
Looking forward to a great 2021 season! Contact Wes McCullough mcculloughw@gmail.com or 617-501-3337 with any questions.
SCOOP Lacrosse - Run by Julie Smail
For girls in Prek, Kindergarten, 1st and 2nd grades
SCOOP Lacrosse is a developmental lacrosse program for girls that teaches the fundamentals of lacrosse in a fun and positive environment.
SCOOP sticks have softer heads which are perfect with the larger, softer balls used to make it easy and fun for beginners.
SCOOP Lacrosse to register and for more information.
