How to Play Lacrosse

Lacrosse is not an easy sport to learn. I played my first year when I was 11 and the end of the year was amazing but the start of the year was miserable. It was cold and I didn’t know what I was doing at all. I’m a pretty athletic kid but this was my first sport where I needed an accessory to play. I needed a stick and a helmet and pads that made me slower but protected me.

Lacrosse is a sport with a lot of hand eye coordination. The first thing you need to do when starting lacrosse is becoming comfortable with your stick. The stick is your best friend cause you use it for everything. You need to learn how to cradle the ball so it doesn’t fall out while you’re running. Cradling is done with your dominant hand high on the stick. You use your wrist to go in a back and forth motion to make sure the ball stays in the mouth of your stick.

Then you need to learn how to catch and shoot the ball. First, catching. You angle your stick about 50 degrees so when it hits the mouth of the stick, it stays in instead of popping back out. Once it’s about to hit your stick, slowly cushion the ball by pulling your stick back just a little to control the ball. Lastly, you need to aim at your target and shoot but wait, don’t go too far back or it will fall out before you swing your stick forward towards the goal.

Lacrosse vs Football

Let’s start with the gear. Both sports use very similar gear. They both use helmets and pads but in different amounts. Football uses full body pads on your arms and legs which protects you more but also makes you slower. Lacrosse uses a chest pad, arm pads, and thick gloves. Which gives less protection but makes you lighter and faster. Lacrosse is also less violent so there are less precautions you need to take.

Next let’s talk about the ball. Football uses a ball about the size of the average person’s head which is pretty big to catch. Lacrosse uses a small ball that you have to catch with your stick which is significantly harder to do and requires more hand eye coordination.

Next, let’s talk about playing time. Lacrosse at the lower level (8th grade and under) there are 4 quarters 8-10 mins long and the high school level is about  10-12 minute quarters.  Those numbers are about the same with football so no matter what sport you’re going to be getting a lot of playing time.

In conclusion, if it was up to me I would pick lacrosse because I wouldn’t get injured as much and it’s still really fun. What sport would you pick?