Why can't we be friends?

I don't remember making friends with girls on opposing teams in high school. They were the enemy and had to be defeated at all costs.

There are benefits to this bilateral, zero sum mindset. Your imagination runs wild with conspiracy theories on the enemy's skills and motivation. You train harder so you're at your best come gameday.

But everything about them still annoys you, even the way they get off the bus. Who do they think they are walking onto our field with that attitude?

Death stare. Give it right back to them.

In these high-test moments, the potential for bonding is higher as you and your teammates box yourselves into a corner.

Wait, what?

If you can relate in any way to the scenario above, if you have ever competed for a spot on a team - whether it's in athletics or professionally - you have failed at accurately assessing your competition at some time or other. And in that inability to see your competition, you probably missed an opportunity to learn, to grow, and to make yourself better.

This realization has made me appreciate all the women my field hockey team faces every Tuesday. I feel grateful to the yellow team for always helping us out when we're short a player. It's the young guns on the gray team that force me to level up my fitness and passing game. And I'm happy to welcome the newest team, who reminds me of how far I've come returning to my favorite sport after a long layoff.

The players on the opposing teams demonstrate skills on turf that I never learned playing on grass. While I may not ever have the perfect reverse sweep, it's still important that I keep setting new goals for myself. Don't give up the ball so quickly in the circle. If you can't steal the ball, at least force their offense to Plan B.

But don't forget, because of the women on the blue and green teams - my fellow competitors - I still get to play.

Professionally, it's easier to make a snap decision about others because it doesn't require deep thought. But we know that's just being lazy. There are lessons to be learned from everybody we meet and work with. Some become major players in our lives and others are sidelined to the bench of our memory. Still, if we are genuinely interested in growing ourselves, we need to take another look across the field. We don't have to be less than our best so they feel better about themselves. But we can put in the work to figure out what our takeaway is and be better.

We don't have to like how the orange team complains about every call, just as long as they don't start beating us.

In My Research

"Before Girls Gotta Run Foundation (GGRF) most of the girls had few if any friends outside of family, but it was obvious that since joining GGRF they had developed close relationships with other GGRF participants. For many of the girls, they were guaranteed the right to go to school under the protection of GGRF where they made friends in class. Those relationships did not end with the school bell, but grew stronger at practice where the Wolaita Soddo girls played team-building games. In Bekoji, girls attended practice in the morning, aiming to be selected for a professional running team. It was in Bekoji that I was reminded of the value of competition. Girls battled to stay with the top pack of runners through grueling workouts under the intense eye of their coach, a former professional runner. I learned that competition spilled over into the classroom, when one of my lunchmates explained that she had to leave early because she had to study for her next national exam. After all, she was the top-ranked student in her class.

Such competition did not get in the way of their personal relationships, as I saw the girls walk arm-in-arm home every day. These experiences brought such nostalgia of my own days as a high school athlete." - Ralls, K. "A MIXED METHODS EXPLORATION OF GIRL ATHLETES’ DEVELOPMENT OF VOICE EMPOWERMENT IN WOLAITA SODDO AND BEKOJI, ETHIOPIA: A THREE ARTICLE DISSERTATION"

Take Her Word for It | Voices of Title IX

"The Chelmsford High School Fight song (or some version of it) is one that has endured since Bernard P. Larkin (Class of 1924) scripted the lyrics decades ago. Women across generations and sports remember yanking on bus windows and belting it out while rolling down the school driveway, much to the chagrin of their bus drivers!

Singing the fight song marked a final burst of energy before disembarking from the bus and disassembling as a team for the night. Especially for those of us who attended high school before social media, it was the best way to alert the rest of the world that we had trounced the enemy.

Our coaches knew how to push us at practice, but there was still lots of fun to be had. The bonding often continued at our friends’ houses, where we fueled up on pasta before the next big competition. As athletes, it seemed like we had boundless energy to sing, dance, dress up, and decorate each other’s lockers."

Women's Sports History

Saturday night I had a funny conversation with a friend who works in downtown Lowell, MA where the inaugural Professional Women's Hockey League championship was recently held.

She had attended a game earlier in the season and hoped to go to the finals until she saw the price jump to four figures. Needless to say, there was a lot of traffic outside the Paul Tsongas Arena on the day of the championship. One of her administrators asked her what the fuss was about. After her explanation of just what a big deal it was for the city to host the Boston and Minnesota teams, he responded with, "So, you're talking about the Stanley Cup?"

She decided only to nod. As she told me after, "History was going to be made that night, whether he understood or not."

I guess this guy will just be a little late to the party.

At KR LLC, we believe women athletes are perfectly positioned to be standout leaders.

And if you want to relive a little bit of your glory years, we’re here for that as well!