The Women's USA Hockey team is standing their ground in what has become a landmark battle in sports equality.  I won't go into the different positions on each side, but if you need to catch up, you can get the full story over at Sports Illustrated.  As I've been watching this play out, I couldn't help but think about women's hockey in Indiana and how it's evolving.

Tell me if this sounds familiar: 

The one girl on your coed team has to get dressed, usually alone, in a separate locker room and sometimes even the women's bathroom. Then, she has to wait outside the team locker room until all the boys are dressed before she can go in.  By this time, the coach may or may not have addressed the team and well, now it's time to take the ice.  

I'm guessing that's probably not the team experience they were dreaming of.  Unfortunately, it's a pretty common sight in Hoosier hockey.  The good news is, that's beginning to change.  In our conversations with the various programs that make up our hockey landscape, we know that there's a lot of thought and considerations going into girl's hockey.  From the Bloomington Banshees and the Indy Fusion to the Gaels of the Irish Youth Hockey League and the Trine women's collegiate hockey program, we're moving in the right direction.  But just like the USA women's team, we have a long way to go before Hoosier girls have the same experience as the boys.

I reached out to Amanda Poynter, who just recently started coaching with one of the Indiana youth organizations, to get her take on the development of girl's hockey and the sport in general.  Her response did not disappoint.  She did a better job summing up issues and calling for change than I could have ever done.    Here's what she had to say: 

I went to ice hockey camp at Penn State in 1993 at the age of 14 and was the ONLY girl in all age groups. I had to room with  the other displaced girls (the girl wrestler and the girl fencers).  There was very little camaraderie or even social interaction off of the ice. 

As for now, twenty-plus years later, girls are still a novelty. We are treated as such and still not taken seriously.

For the sake of time, I will not even touch the topic of shoulder pads and other gear not made for women, and jump straight into locker rooms. In my old age I have become a little crotchety about my locker room situation. I no longer accept a chair in the restroom as acceptable (as recent as the past year it has still been suggested as an option to me!).  I also make sure that I have a shower available. putting girls in a "party room" with no shower is still not the same as a locker room.  I was playing in tournament three years ago and the organizers put all 4 women (yes only 4 women total out of 16 teams) in a room reserved for birthday parties.  When I asked about showering they said I would have to wait until my team was out of the locker room and use it last. I waited nearly an hour for a shower. After the next game I met with the organizers and they let me use the shower of a team who was already on the ice. Well, some of their players got in fights and ejected early and it was ugly.  Now women have their own locker room, albeit on the other side of the rink, away from all the teams.   I don't want to sound like a complainer (but Jeremy, you asked) this isn't exactly what we wanted either...a locker room, tucked back in a corner, away from the hub of the excitement, isolated from our team and out of the loop. But it'll have to do, for now.

As for on the ice, we need more women coaching.  I love men, but they struggle when it comes to communicating with young girls.  Coaching girls comes with its own set of challenges, which can be much different than coaching boys.  Not all girls respond to losing the same, not all girls are motivated the same way, and also, not all girls want pink jerseys.

Aside from the general facility issues and the lack of female coaching  she spoke of,  Amanda also pointed out that women's hockey faces equality issues in the game itself:

I also have an issue with the rules of women's USA hockey. Why is there no checking? Why must they wear cages? I despise these rules. These are women playing against women, so let them play. These rules completely change the way the game is played and hobbles the players. When you take checking out of the game you allow defensemen to be defenseless; sure it speeds up the game, but at what cost? Women's hockey will never be able to move forward if at the very least our rules are not equal. I watched the Isobel Cup finals and thought it was slow and even a little hard to watch, but that is because of rules like this (and lack of player development which I'll get to). What is wrong with women checking women?!

When asked about USA Hockey's role in the current dispute as well as their commitment to growing girl's hockey in general, she had this to say:

I'm not a fan of USA Hockey.  It seems most grass-roots girl's programs aren't being funded by them, they're being funded by the NHL or affiliates. During the lockout when hockey needed more promotion, (perfect opportunity to promote girls hockey) they were nowhere to be found. I mentioned lack of player development above and I found this to be very interesting:

http://www.pensionplanpuppets.com/2017/3/20/14938214/toronto-maple-leafs-auston-matthews-makenna-newkirk-case-against-usa-hockey-boston-college-women.

My favorite part is: "Look at the Kessel siblings. Phil spent two years with the National Team Development Program, while Amanda attended Shattuck St. Mary’s for four years. She scored over 100 points her last three years of high school, before heading to the University of Minnesota, where she would play on one of the greatest college hockey teams of all time. Amanda’s the best hockey player in the Kessel family—if she’d gotten the same opportunities as her brother, fewer people would think that’s just a meme."

But more poignant is this: "No one is expecting them to come up with a female National Team Development Program out of whole-cloth before the World Championships start, but to repeat, girls’ development is so low-priority it doesn’t even have a designated line in their budget. Efforts to give their teenage girl members (who, it must be noted, pay membership dues just like the boys) more than a couple weeks of camp every summer isn’t just the right thing to do morally, it’s the right thing to do from a growth perspective."

Girls are so low priority that the women's gold medal was omitted from the 2014 Sochi jersey, and only the men's ice hockey team (who failed to medal) were invited to the unveiling ceremony. Because this attitude is so commonplace at the top, it trickles down and infects every facet of athletics for girls. Girls are are so low priority that they are not being developed equitably and are an afterthought in most youth hockey organizations. The women's national hockey team is the most powerful voice a female ice hockey player has to represent them and they understand that. Until they won several medals, they would not even have a strong enough voice.  But now they are speaking on behalf of all of us. I hope they get paid more, but what they have done is even more than that. They brought attention to an issue that has stagnated over the years. They made it possible for this article to even be written.

The women of the USA Hockey national team are willing to sacrifice their shot at bringing home gold for their country in order to right the balance of gender equality.  If that's not a worthy story for all young people to hear, then I'm not sure there is one.  When a deal gets worked out, and it will get worked out, these women will be heroes before they even take the ice. 

 So, Hoosier Hockey Faithful, this is our proverbial iron and it's hot.  You won't have a better time to strike if you're interested in growing girl's hockey.   You've got six months before next season starts, so let the planning begin!

We'd love to hear your thoughts.  Post your comments below and let's get a healthy conversation going!