National Collegiate Athletic Association
NCAA News Archive - 2007
« back to 2007 | Back to NCAA News Archive Index
Breaking the ice
Collegiate women warmed up to hockey four decades ago
Collegiate women warmed up to hockey four decades ago
|
By Leilana McKindra
The NCAA News
The NCAA News
Former Brown University women’s ice hockey player Cappy Nunlist had grown up skating on outdoor ponds in Greenfield, Massachusetts, but she had never skated in a rink. She never had even seen a hockey game before she arrived at the Providence, Rhode Island, campus in the mid-1960s.
That didn’t stop her from gamely answering the call during her freshman year, when one of her suitemates began enlisting players for the women’s ice hockey team on behalf of her sister, who co-captained the squad. In doing so Fox, Nunlist and others who did the same became part of a daring new venture — and a defining moment — in intercollegiate sport: women’s ice hockey.
At the time, the women’s college at Brown was known as Pembroke, and in 1964, well before the passage of the landmark Title IX legislation in 1973, the school became home to the Pandas, the nation’s first intercollegiate women’s ice hockey program. Since then, Brown has taken a lead role in an effort that not only marks a critical milestone in women’s sport but also has led to one of the NCAA’s most anticipated national championships — the Women’s Frozen Four.
For all of the excitement and enthusiasm women’s ice hockey generates for fans and participants alike these days, the journey to its current success started against a similar backdrop. At the time, though, the cheers reverberating through the rafters of the newly built rink on the Brown campus were for the men’s team. According to Arlene Gorton, then director of athletics at Pembroke (she later became an associate athletics director when the college merged with Brown), the men’s ice hockey program was so popular that students would stand in line overnight to get tickets.
“Ice hockey became an on-campus rage,” said Gorton. “It was pretty natural that the women were going to want to be part of this.”
A couple of years later, that’s exactly what happened. Pembroke sponsored 10 other varsity sports, but not ice hockey. In response to the interest, Gorton began securing ice time for the women. The team practiced three hours a week, generally at off hours (such as 11 p.m. on Sundays) after the men had finished practicing and recreational skating hours had ended.
Equipment was scarce. Jerseys were donated, though most came in boys’ sizes. The rest of the uniform consisted of wheat-colored jeans, a turtle neck and any kind of leather gloves the players could procure.
Jan Lutz, who as a physical education associate at the school was eventually assigned to help oversee the team, said ice hockey skates for women didn’t exist then, so the students provided their own figure skates and shaved off the toe picks. They used field hockey shin guards, which protected either the knees or the shin, but not both.
“We had helmets with mouth guards, shin guards and elbow guards, and that was it,” said former Brown ice hockey student-athlete Marcia Hoffer Brown. A fan of the game throughout high school, she attended a clinic sponsored by the Pandas and was invited to join the team beginning in 1967. “We did not have a coach. It was usually a matter of whoever was dating someone on the men’s team would try to rope him into coaching us.”
For the fun of it
The squad relied on volunteer coaches until the 1974-75 season, when Steve Shea, a former ice hockey player at Brown, became the team’s first dedicated coach.
Despite the odd practice times, the makeshift and ill-fitting equipment, and the lack of a consistent coaching presence, enthusiasm among the players was high, as was the skill with which they played.
Nunlist said the players appreciated the support they received from the women’s athletics department, their families and their peers on the men’s hockey team.
“In spite of the fact that we were pretty awful, we were not laughed at,” said Nunlist. “We had a tremendous amount of fun without the intense pressure that comes with playing a varsity sport today. I was always aware of the rather unique position we were in — the first college hockey team in the U.S. I remember watching ‘A League of Their Own’ many years later and feeling a real kinship with those pioneers.”
In addition to overseeing their own program, Brown administrators Gorton and Lutz, and players such as Nunlist, worked to spread the sport to other colleges and universities. It was a tough sell initially, according to Gorton, who said a number of her physical education associates were shocked that she would allow women to play ice hockey. Other institutions in the surrounding area didn’t embrace the concept warmly, either.
Nunlist recalled visiting a high school boyfriend in 1968 who attended the University of New Hampshire. During the visit she made an appointment with the head of the women’s athletics department to discuss the possibility of establishing a women’s program there.
“I made my pitch suggesting they start a team and was told in no uncertain terms that hockey was a men’s sport and that UNH would never consider starting a women’s team,” said Nunlist.
Not too many years later, though, New Hampshire did establish its own team.
In the meantime, the Brown squad found competition where it could, including trips to Montreal to play in an annual tournament there. Wives of a local semiprofessional team, the Walpole Brooms (the women dubbed themselves “the Broomettes”) also offered a competitive outlet.
Hoffer Brown said the team sold World’s Finest Chocolate bars and Panda Power buttons to raise travel money. She also recalled playing against members of the men’s team to gain game experience.
“The first time we went to Canada, none of us had any kind of game experience, so we put together a little game with the guys,” she said. “The guys played with brooms and we played with sticks and pucks so we’d learn about changing lines.”
Beginning of something special
Now more the four decades since the Pembroke Pandas first set blades to ice, women’s ice hockey has exploded. Among the most notable changes, said Gorton, are the heightened level of skill and the availability of coaches who have a sense of leading women athletes. Title IX has done much to fuel the evolution of the sport, of course. So, too, has Brown. Gorton and Lutz were instrumental in helping to draw up the rules of the game, which they said remain largely unchanged today. Their goal was to make it a safe and simple game.
“There weren’t any rules for women but we knew we didn’t want some of the things the men did, like body checking,” said Lutz. “In the beginning, we didn’t even allow them to lift the puck. We figured we didn’t have enough equipment. Plus, at that time, everybody stereotyped that if they played ice hockey they’d end up as brides walking down the aisle with scarred faces.”
Gorton also was involved in establishing an Ivy Group championship for women’s ice hockey, the first of which was contested in 1976.
Now Brown has on its staff Digit Murphy, who Gorton describes as “a battering ram for the development of women’s ice hockey.” Murphy took over the program in 1989-9
“She just worked and worked,” Gorton said. “She served on committees, she raised difficult questions — she refused to be told no.”
The effort has paid dividends. Women’s ice hockey debuted as an NCAA championship sport in 2001, and the Bears made their first appearance in Women’s Frozen Four the following year. Brown also claims seven former players who have gone on to become Olympians since women’s ice hockey was introduced to the Winter Games in 1998.
Though certainly none of those players in the beginning could have predicted exactly how popular women’s ice hockey would become, Gorton said they had their suspicions.
“My feeling as an athletics administrator at Pembroke and Brown was that the women should have access to anything they want. The model was there. Ice hockey and national championships don’t belong solely to the men,” she said. “Why do you climb Everest? Because it’s there. Why did the women want to play hockey? Because it was there. The struggle involved a lot of people who were very committed and dedicated, not the least of whom were the student-athletes themselves.”0 and this year became just the third coach in women’s collegiate ice hockey to win 300 games.
That didn’t stop her from gamely answering the call during her freshman year, when one of her suitemates began enlisting players for the women’s ice hockey team on behalf of her sister, who co-captained the squad. In doing so Fox, Nunlist and others who did the same became part of a daring new venture — and a defining moment — in intercollegiate sport: women’s ice hockey.
At the time, the women’s college at Brown was known as Pembroke, and in 1964, well before the passage of the landmark Title IX legislation in 1973, the school became home to the Pandas, the nation’s first intercollegiate women’s ice hockey program. Since then, Brown has taken a lead role in an effort that not only marks a critical milestone in women’s sport but also has led to one of the NCAA’s most anticipated national championships — the Women’s Frozen Four.
For all of the excitement and enthusiasm women’s ice hockey generates for fans and participants alike these days, the journey to its current success started against a similar backdrop. At the time, though, the cheers reverberating through the rafters of the newly built rink on the Brown campus were for the men’s team. According to Arlene Gorton, then director of athletics at Pembroke (she later became an associate athletics director when the college merged with Brown), the men’s ice hockey program was so popular that students would stand in line overnight to get tickets.
“Ice hockey became an on-campus rage,” said Gorton. “It was pretty natural that the women were going to want to be part of this.”
A couple of years later, that’s exactly what happened. Pembroke sponsored 10 other varsity sports, but not ice hockey. In response to the interest, Gorton began securing ice time for the women. The team practiced three hours a week, generally at off hours (such as 11 p.m. on Sundays) after the men had finished practicing and recreational skating hours had ended.
Equipment was scarce. Jerseys were donated, though most came in boys’ sizes. The rest of the uniform consisted of wheat-colored jeans, a turtle neck and any kind of leather gloves the players could procure.
Jan Lutz, who as a physical education associate at the school was eventually assigned to help oversee the team, said ice hockey skates for women didn’t exist then, so the students provided their own figure skates and shaved off the toe picks. They used field hockey shin guards, which protected either the knees or the shin, but not both.
“We had helmets with mouth guards, shin guards and elbow guards, and that was it,” said former Brown ice hockey student-athlete Marcia Hoffer Brown. A fan of the game throughout high school, she attended a clinic sponsored by the Pandas and was invited to join the team beginning in 1967. “We did not have a coach. It was usually a matter of whoever was dating someone on the men’s team would try to rope him into coaching us.”
For the fun of it
The squad relied on volunteer coaches until the 1974-75 season, when Steve Shea, a former ice hockey player at Brown, became the team’s first dedicated coach.
Despite the odd practice times, the makeshift and ill-fitting equipment, and the lack of a consistent coaching presence, enthusiasm among the players was high, as was the skill with which they played.
Nunlist said the players appreciated the support they received from the women’s athletics department, their families and their peers on the men’s hockey team.
“In spite of the fact that we were pretty awful, we were not laughed at,” said Nunlist. “We had a tremendous amount of fun without the intense pressure that comes with playing a varsity sport today. I was always aware of the rather unique position we were in — the first college hockey team in the U.S. I remember watching ‘A League of Their Own’ many years later and feeling a real kinship with those pioneers.”
In addition to overseeing their own program, Brown administrators Gorton and Lutz, and players such as Nunlist, worked to spread the sport to other colleges and universities. It was a tough sell initially, according to Gorton, who said a number of her physical education associates were shocked that she would allow women to play ice hockey. Other institutions in the surrounding area didn’t embrace the concept warmly, either.
Nunlist recalled visiting a high school boyfriend in 1968 who attended the University of New Hampshire. During the visit she made an appointment with the head of the women’s athletics department to discuss the possibility of establishing a women’s program there.
“I made my pitch suggesting they start a team and was told in no uncertain terms that hockey was a men’s sport and that UNH would never consider starting a women’s team,” said Nunlist.
Not too many years later, though, New Hampshire did establish its own team.
In the meantime, the Brown squad found competition where it could, including trips to Montreal to play in an annual tournament there. Wives of a local semiprofessional team, the Walpole Brooms (the women dubbed themselves “the Broomettes”) also offered a competitive outlet.
Hoffer Brown said the team sold World’s Finest Chocolate bars and Panda Power buttons to raise travel money. She also recalled playing against members of the men’s team to gain game experience.
“The first time we went to Canada, none of us had any kind of game experience, so we put together a little game with the guys,” she said. “The guys played with brooms and we played with sticks and pucks so we’d learn about changing lines.”
Beginning of something special
Now more the four decades since the Pembroke Pandas first set blades to ice, women’s ice hockey has exploded. Among the most notable changes, said Gorton, are the heightened level of skill and the availability of coaches who have a sense of leading women athletes. Title IX has done much to fuel the evolution of the sport, of course. So, too, has Brown. Gorton and Lutz were instrumental in helping to draw up the rules of the game, which they said remain largely unchanged today. Their goal was to make it a safe and simple game.
“There weren’t any rules for women but we knew we didn’t want some of the things the men did, like body checking,” said Lutz. “In the beginning, we didn’t even allow them to lift the puck. We figured we didn’t have enough equipment. Plus, at that time, everybody stereotyped that if they played ice hockey they’d end up as brides walking down the aisle with scarred faces.”
Gorton also was involved in establishing an Ivy Group championship for women’s ice hockey, the first of which was contested in 1976.
Now Brown has on its staff Digit Murphy, who Gorton describes as “a battering ram for the development of women’s ice hockey.” Murphy took over the program in 1989-9
“She just worked and worked,” Gorton said. “She served on committees, she raised difficult questions — she refused to be told no.”
The effort has paid dividends. Women’s ice hockey debuted as an NCAA championship sport in 2001, and the Bears made their first appearance in Women’s Frozen Four the following year. Brown also claims seven former players who have gone on to become Olympians since women’s ice hockey was introduced to the Winter Games in 1998.
Though certainly none of those players in the beginning could have predicted exactly how popular women’s ice hockey would become, Gorton said they had their suspicions.
“My feeling as an athletics administrator at Pembroke and Brown was that the women should have access to anything they want. The model was there. Ice hockey and national championships don’t belong solely to the men,” she said. “Why do you climb Everest? Because it’s there. Why did the women want to play hockey? Because it was there. The struggle involved a lot of people who were very committed and dedicated, not the least of whom were the student-athletes themselves.”0 and this year became just the third coach in women’s collegiate ice hockey to win 300 games.
© 2010 The National Collegiate Athletic Association
Terms and Conditions | Privacy Policy