Goals by females weighted more
By: Meghan Prichard, Staff Writer
Posterd: 9/21/07 In The Daily Tarheel
(Yes, I know this is old, but I wanted to document it before they took it off their website)
When captain Amanda Marvelle scores a touchdown for her flag football team, Weapons of Grass Destruction, she brings in nine points.
But when her opponent, captain Josh Meyer of the Decrepit Elders, scores the same touchdown, he only gets six points.
In co-recreational intramural sports, women score more points for goals than men.
"The purpose of the rule is to get women more involved," said Dustin Van Sloten, intramural sports director.
But the rule, which was established by the National Intramural-Recreational Sports Association, has larger ramifications, as some see it as an inequality for women.
"I feel that the national guidelines are outdated and insulting to women," said Barbara Osborne, a professor in the Department of Exercise and Sport Science and an adjunct law professor.
"There may have been a time when you needed to make accommodations for women to feel comfortable competing with men. … But those days are long gone."
This year there are 1,238 men participating in UNC's intramural sports program. But the number of women is more than four times that - with 5,584 participants.
Matt Ezzell, a sixth-year graduate student in the Department of Sociology, said the point rules are just one example of institutional discrimination in sports.
"The scoring discrepancy reflects a belief that women are not as capable and need allowances made for them," he said. "Changing sports rules for women implies that the real athletes are men."
But some intramural sports participants say the disparity in scoring is beneficial - for both men and women.
Mary Casale, a 2006 UNC graduate and an intern for intramural sports, said the rules help even the playing field.
"Especially in football, guys are just more dominating," Casale said. "If women only got six points, guys wouldn't care to have them participate."
All team members still must be good to win, Marvelle said, adding that they also must rely more on strategy to do so.
In addition to scoring differences, a female must be involved in at least every other play.
"The rule makes it harder to plan out plays and know who you're going to throw to," Meyer said.
With the rule, the Decrepit Elders team has developed a strategy to encourage female participation.
"We have plays drawn up to get girls involved," Meyer said.
The overall accommodations made for women also have had a positive effect on some of the team's interaction, Marvelle said.
Similar to flag football, basketball goals scored by women count for three points regardless of their location on the court.
Men follow traditional scoring rules.
"We've tried many different approaches to create an equal playing field for women," Van Sloten said.
According to a survey conducted by Intramural Sports, about two-thirds of survey participants responded that females should receive more points for scoring in co-recreational basketball.
Some schools require a female to touch the ball during every possession and even ban men from the free-throw lane, Van Sloten said.
"We took those two rules away because it affected the game as a whole," he said.
Since the original NIRSA rule book was published in 1985, other rule options have been provided, allowing individual schools to determine play level.
At N.C. State University, intramural sports follow the same NIRSA guidelines for flag football. But scoring is the same for both genders in basketball.
"We don't want to put any additional pressure on officials," said Rick Palmieri, coordinator of intramural sports at N.C. State.
And at Duke University, where basketball is the only co-recreational intramural sport, the rule book states that two women per team must be on the court at all times.
But as far as playing and scoring go, Mike Forbes, director of Intramurals, Sports Clubs and Recreation at Duke, said there should be no difference for men and women.
"Students shouldn't be coerced into trying to favor women being the ones that score," he said. "It cheapens the experience."
Despite the scoring and game play differences, many students said they find the policies acceptable.
"We're playing co-ed for a reason - so we can play with our friends that are girls, as well," Meyer said. "I think it's fair to do."
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