After many years of the field not being in use, John Dewey High School finally renovated its field in the summer of 2024. This sets a transformative impact on the sports teams in the school that need a field. The big question is, what role will the new field play in the school’s community and the retention of the girls lacrosse team?
With the majority of the team being veteran players that graduated, the team will need a lot of new players. However, this has complications due to the unpopularity of lacrosse in New York City. The school not being able to utilize its field placed setbacks on the girls lacrosse team as students could not see themselves what lacrosse was truly about.
Lacrosse is a sport that is hardly broadcasted compared to known sports such as soccer, volleyball, etc. Thus, it is hard to expose a sport to students that they are not familiar with. The new field gives opportunities in promoting girls lacrosse.
“A lot of times people get interested in a sport or club by just being in the right place at the right time” said McGowan, coach of the girls lacrosse team. “The new field will give more exposure for students, just more chances to see and experience new things.
“If that sparks an interest, it will be even easier for them to try out that new thing on the field”, McGowan added. “Even though the team is not new, the field gives a fresh start where people feel like they are joining and being a part of something that hasn’t existed for too long before”.
The new field provides a way for students to explore an interest in lacrosse. When the field could not be used, recruiting players was hard to showcase, so the question rises on how was the team even able to practice?
“We go all the way to Calvert to practice and I’m sure in the past that’s one of the reasons why people didn’t want to join because it was a long commute” said Queen Esther Guy, manager of the girls lacrosse team. “Going to Calvert just for practice was very annoying, especially when the season first started.
“Me being manager, I make appearances at practices to show I am there for the team,” Queen added. “I have to sit in the cold while everyone is running around, so just going is pretty annoying because it is cold and there is no reliable transportation nearby”.
There were many complications with having to use a public field for practices.
“Practice was a shared public space, we had to place permits but when they weren’t given, there was competition with other teams or other non teams who just wanted to use the field” McGowan said.
There were also many issues with not having a field for home games as the team would have to travel to other far away places.
“In the past, I have gotten a lot of complaints from my teachers for being just the manager, not a player. They get upset that I miss class,” Queen said. “It would be easier on managers and the team if we had home games on our own field since they wouldn’t have to leave class 3 periods earlier just to make it to Randall’s Island on time. They can go to all their classes then just go to their game which is in the backyard.
“It is also easier on the coach as well as the players because the coach is not just a coach, but he is also a teacher,” Queen added. “With our own field, the coach doesn’t have to find someone to cover the periods that he is leaving for”.
The new field erases the inconveniences that came with having to share a space with the public. Being able to have practices and home games at school will make things easier for the team, and will benefit the school community overall.
“The new field will impact the performance of the team because now we have field lines, there are definitive rules we can place on the field everyday,” McGowan said. “They were hard to enforce without a field, so I expect our players to have higher IQ–to know the rules better and to use them to our advantage–to perform better overall”.
These changes that the field sets on the team will push them to overcome their boundaries.
“The new field will impact the morale of the lacrosse team through the rest of the school faculty and body being so close to us” said Nyomi Cadet, a player on the girls lacrosse team. “We know we are representing John Dewey, so it will make us only want to work harder. More people can watch us practice or play games after school, so there is more support”.
The field gives the school a sense of home due to the crowd and familiarity.
“A couple of schools that stick out to me are fields like Curtis” McGowan said. “They call Curtis’s field ‘the Castle’, and when the school has home games the school takes spirit in defending its castle.
“Even though you are not on the team, you feel like you have a role as someone in the stands to go on and cheer your classmates and represent your school with pride,” McGowan added. “I want us to take more pride in our field as an extension of our school in the sense of ‘this is ours’, ‘we want to protect it’, and ‘we are proud of it’”.
“What we are known for is a nice combination of competitiveness, seriousness, obligation, determination,” McGowan concludes. “I want to keep that brand, but the field will allow us to showcase it and allow us to add people to our brand”.
The future of girls lacrosse is now set with the field’s reemergence as it encourages school appreciation and the sport’s growth.
