Why Play Lacrosse?
Lacrosse is an incomparable sport! It’s known as “The fastest sport on two feet!” It combines many other sporting skills and can create a versatile player. It’s challenging, a lot of fun and adds the opportunity to be part of a team and make new friends.
Bringing Lacrosse to West Grey
Since 2015, Lacrosse has been available in Durham. It was started by a small group of parents who wanted their kids to experience the sport. Experienced coaches have come on board and the program has grown. It ran as a “skills and drills” league with shinny games and even lead to exhibition games against Saugeen Shores in 2016 and 2017.
In efforts to have the kids experience more games, the league applied to the Ontario Lacrosse Association (OLA) in 2018 and was granted approval to join Zone play as house league team. In 2019, the West Grey Rampage Rep teams competed in the Association's first OLA Provincial Championships. The Tyke division brought home West Grey's first OLA provincial title and the PeeWee 1 team brought home a Zone 8 Championship.
Building on the successes from 2015 through 2019 seasons, the future for the West Grey Minor Lacrosse Association looked very promising. However, in 2020 the COVID pandemic suspended all lacrosse operations in Ontario. In 2021 a modified in-house program revived the Rampage association, offering a combination of indoor and outdoor play, getting kids active once again.
2022 saw the return of tournaments, regular season play and the revival of the OLA's lacrosse festival (Provincial Championships). The U17 team brought home the Association's second ever provincial title, the U13 Team 1 brought home a provincial silver medal and the U9 Team 1 & U11 Team 1 both brought home Zone 8 Championships. 2023 brought our first U22 team Along with more Zone 8 and Ola Provincial success.
The sport of Lacrosse continues to grow here in West Grey. It would not be possible with out you the community. Our referees, volunteers, sponsors, arena staff, executive, parents and of course the kids on the floor. This is such a beautiful sport and we are strong because of all you.
With that being said, travel teams typically play 10+/- season games (half of them being home games) in late May until mid July against other clubs in Zone 8 and can participate in local tournaments and provincials (held early August). Try Lacrosse starting in middle of February and weekly practices should begin in late March early April.
We hope to keep growing and offering Lacrosse to the West Grey community. Thanks again for your continued support.
Make sure to always keep an eye on our website and social media pages for all the latest information!
And always Go Rampage!
Wayne Gretzky on Lacrosse
It is interesting to note what hockey great Wayne Gretzky wrote in his National Post column in March, 2000:
“If sport has a high point of the year, it must be the first week of spring.”
“…When I was growing up, I used to love this time of year. It was when I put
my hockey equipment away and I was absolutely ecstatic to see the end
of the hockey season. One of the worst things to happen to the game,
in my opinion, has been year-round hockey and, in particular, summer hockey."
“All it does for kids, as far as I can tell, is keep them out of sports they should
be doing in warmer weather. I could hardly wait to get my lacrosse stick out
and start throwing the ball around. It didn’t matter how cold or rainy it would be,
we’d be out firing the ball against walls and working on our moves as we played
the lacrosse equivalent to road hockey.”
“All the good hockey players seemed to play lacrosse in those days and everyone
of them learned something from the game to carry over to the other – things
athletes can only learn by mixing up games they play when they are young.”
