By Claudia Bellofatto SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News)– When it comes to sports, the battle of the sexes is a phenomenon that has gone on for years.
Syracuse University fifth-year hockey player Dakota Derrer says being on the women’s hockey team means hearing a lot of the same criticism, “You hear it all the time … we aren’t strong enough … we’re not good enough, we’re not fast enough.”
But Dakota’s team proves they’re a force to be reckoned with.
“We are one of the toughest teams,” she says of the D-1 squad. And their record proves it; posting an 11-8-1 mark against CHA opponents in 2017-18.
But it’s not just their success that keeps players like Dakota coming back.
“I love hockey but … but it’s the girls. They’re my family,” she says.
And Dakota is not the only one who thinks that way about her team.
“It feels like a family, everyone says the same thing,” teammate Brooke Avery says, “It’s like having 20 sisters.”
Brooke Avery is one of team’s most valuable players . But even she says with her handwork, she doesn’t quite get recognition.
“People know about our team but not in the same capacity as people know about the men’s league … At most schools it’s men first and then come the women. It feels like women are stepping in the shoes of men a little bit,” she says.
But for Brooke and her teammates, its the doubters who push them to work even harder
“It’s just as hard to play a women’s sport,” she says, “We are really trying to push, especially in the hockey world, motivating yourself … because you can play division one; there’s more teams everyday.”
Going into his eleventh year as head coach, Paul Flanagan says its a role he never saw himself taking on
“For 17 years I coached men … I never envisioned I would be coaching women … I thought I was taking a real gamble,” he says, but in the end, “I got into the women’s game and I’ve never looked back.”
