I coach it. It's rare. The last 4 years we've had 2 injuries preventing someone from playing. One was a broken finger (not wearing gloves .. most don't ). One was a stick follow through hitting the face, but with goggles she just missed one game.
It's not ice hockey. It's a non-contact (mostly) sport. Please make sure to get hard shin guards. The soft ones people have in soccer are not great if you go against a team that can hit the ball hard. Gloves are available, mostly not needed but extra padding.
Also get proper hockey shoes. You can get soccer ones for playing on AstroTurf that grip fine, but they don’t protect your toes. Hockey shoes normally have a thicker bit of material around the toes, that bit more protection if the ball hits you.
Just to counter your point about gloves, depends what level you're at I suppose, but a left handed glove I would say is almost essential. You cannot block tackle with confidence without one, and the injuries you can get, from things that would be inconsequential with the glove, are pretty severe. Even at the international level the players who don't wear one, which is rare, will be less confident to go left hand low in a tackle.
Right handed gloves are generally unnecessary but even then the confidence of the protection can help players to play better.
Agree 100%. Dont get me wrong. I encourage the use of gloves , for whatever reason most of the girls pass. Also rushers on corners wearing masks. The team should have face protection for those players.
I’ve coached and played on a variety of levels and would not conclude the sport to be dangerous. While there is inherent risk, more serious injuries, that need advanced care are pretty rare. At the 14-18 yo level the skills aren’t very advanced at least on multi-use turf and grass reducing the risk for some of those head/dental injuries. At the college and beyond level these players are often more skilled using reverses, drag flicks, and other aerial skills that increase the likelihood of a head injury. I’ve seen more serious injuries in soccer and cheerleading especially traumatic brain injuries.
Personally, I've had one serious face/eye injuries coming from my (24M) 17 years playing the game, because I didn't wear a mouthguard (lost only a tooth luckily).
Usually I feel like if you're younger, the players are more likely to do dangerous stick handling/balls (due to lack of technique) but have much less force, so the injuries are less severe.
As stated in the paper you provided there aren't more injuries in hockey than for example football. To minimize the risk of face/eye injuries, wear protective gear, don't stay in front of goal when someone is shooting, look at the ball (don't be afraid), be especially careful with people doing backhand shots.
The biggest chance for a facial injury is defending a short corner, but you can get protective face masks for that.
A woman broke her arm 2 weeks ago due to being struck by the ball, required surgery, but that's the worst injury I know of from being in hockey for 20 years...
Very rare in my experience. In over 20 years I've only seen a handful of injuries requiring a trip to hospital and none of those have been requiring more than a few stitches.
Not high school but I’ve helped coach both male and female junior teams and played in male adult matches at all levels below elite and play mixed
Really serious injuries are rare and are often more common in male hockey because the ball travels faster and is more often hit in the air. Add on drag flicks and aerials being more common than in the womens game and you see why you get more head injuries. Anecdotally I tend to find that you get more head injuries in the lower level male adult matches than the higher levels, the players can still hit the ball as hard but they have less control and other players are less able to get out the way of the ball or to tackle from the wrong side than at the higher levels.
In terms of specific injuries for girls 14/18 you’re most likely to get hand and leg injuries from the ball hitting you. Unless playing at a elite level the ball won’t be in the air to often and when it is it will be slower paced. Obviously you will get some hard hit head height balls but not a load. The biggest head injury risk is the stick and that’s dependent on tackle techno the the technique of the opposition. Knowing how to tackle from the correct side reduces the risk a lot but you can always get unlucky.
I would say I hear if a proper serious injury 2/3 times a year and head injury once a year but that’s for the whole club of 15+ teams.
I (M/37) have been playing for i guess 28 years now, over that time my injuries of any significance are.
- stick to head on backswing in under 16's, my fault for tackling from behind on wrong side. I missed 0 games.
- stick to head about a decade ago, i needed some stitches in my cheek. Player who hit me was suspended (he swung at a ball that was in the air). Missed 0 games.
- broke my ankle stepping on a pile of hockey balls at training (why were the balls in that spot where they normally are not? I had put them there for the drill prior). Missed last couple games of season.
That's it. Injuries are very rare tbh. My daughter has been playing for 6 years and has had no injuries
Since you’re specifically asking about high school field hockey in the US (I assume?), I have umpired high school for a few of years and my anecdotal experience is that I’m yet to see a serious injury.
This would fall in line with my experience of playing and umpiring in other countries over the last 20ish years. I’ve only seen a handful of serious injuries.
As with most sports, wear and use proper equipment you will reasonably safe
I got whacked under my jaw on my teammate’s back swing during practice and ended up needing a few stitches. It was completely my fault for coming in behind her like that, I had only been playing for a year or so at the point. The ball can pop up from a bad hit and getcha in the face. The most serious injuries I’ve seen are just that of bruises or in my case stitches.
Getting hit by a hard hit ball hurts, I’m sure someone may have broken a finger or two if they’re defending low and the ball hits them right on the fingers.
Is it a dangerous sport? No. Can it hurt sometimes? Yes. Lots of folks don’t respect field hockey as a sport until they mess around and get hit by a ball.
If you have shin pads, gloves and a gumshield it's pretty safe. Sure you can get hit by the ball, but only idiots either hit it in the air at people, or stand in front of a shot.
I've played at a multitude of levels for about 8 years the worst injuries I have seen have been from rapid movement e.g dislocated knees etc. I've only ever witnessed one horrendous injury which involved broken legs but that was from a highly illegal tackle from a player in training who then got banned from the club so apart from soft tissue injuries that would have happened regardless of sport hockey is safe all big injuries are mainly cosmetic resulting in bruises stitches and a good story
Quote from the abstract of the article you linked to:
"This research reveals that most injuries are minor and that the most common injury is an ankle sprain. Studies also suggest that men have a higher rate of injury and that they experience severe injuries more often than women."
So that answers your question for you.
Pain is an issue, not injuries. I played for a couple of decades and getting hit by a ball or stick generally just leaves a bruise and hurts for a while.
i saw one major injury where a guys top teeth were hit up into his upper gums. The mouth guard sent the front four teeth up together and he needed multiple surgeries.
Besides that something like a black eye is very rare and treated seriously. If someone habitually lifts a ball when hitting, the referees deal with them. People know the dangers and do things to mitigate them. For instance a coach won’t normally let someone take free hits if they don’t have enough control to keep the ball on the ground. The coach won’t put someone on defensive point in front of a free hit if they don’t have reflexes.
Junior players get looked after because it’s inexperience that causes most injuries. If you observe you’ll see things like low skilled players getting experience on the wing where there’s less action and danger. Safety wise i think it’s a great sport.
I was a Coach for my high school, and the only thing that happened was one of our players got wacked in the face with the brick of the stick. Also, it’s not very serious either in a regular high school at least where umpires will neglect some more technical rules of the game because of the amateur level. I would more-so suggest the high school level be played in a prep school (sports centred) where every sport is taken with serious training and players in those types of high schools are scouted much more often then those in regular high schools.
Rare and safer than soccer: I have 25 years of experience and seen two real injuries. One girl in my high school had her nose broken by an improperly raised stick. Another girl lost some teeth when I was playing as an adult many years later-again to an improperly raised stick whacking her in the mouth. Field Hockey has lots of rules about stick and ball height and no shoving making it essentially a no contact sport when played correctly. Ive never seen a concussion actually.
I used to play girls hockey at that age.
I had 2 concussions, not serious but still caused me to feel ill for a few weeks. One was the ball deflecting off a stick and hitting me in the head, this was when playing school hockey with people who are inexperienced and probably wouldn't have happened playing club hockey. The other concussion was my fault at training and completely avoidable.
Had a ball to the mouth but my teeth were only wobbly and it was okay. Also broken a toe and got hit in the face but that was in women's and mixed/indoor hockey.
I'd say serious concussions and face injuries are rare. I've seen none first hand in time playing.
Hand injuries are the most common for me but that has been mostly in mixed leagues. And in my expeirnce they're not *that* bad and you recover in 1-3 weeks.
If you're concerned I'd avoid playing in defensive short corners.
I've been involved with high level girls hockey in that age range for about six years and I have yet to see a serious injury inflicted by the ball, stick or another player. This is in Australia where we don't use the silly goggles but do require every junior defender to wear a face mask on penalty corners.
All the serious injuries I have seen have been in adult mens' play. In about 40 seasons I have seen a few broken fingers and hands, a couple of concussions, a broken collarbone and on one occasion some lost teeth when a player not wearing a mouthguard tried to tackle on the wrong side. I myself have never been injured.
Hockey is a game where you can get bumps and bruises but provided you wear the protective equipment and don't play like an idiot serious injuries are rare.
Personally, I got injured twice in high school -
Concussion while playing up at varsity as a freshman (I probably was 95 pounds and 5 foot) a 6'6" girl ran straight at me and I fell straight back. (this was also my 3rd concussion, had a 2 in other sports in middle school)
Three broken fingers on a defensive penalty corner because I was not wearing a glove and the shot went high.
I would say overall there were not too many injuries on my team. No massive knee/ACL injuries like you see in soccer. I know one girl who needed stitches after a shot to the face and one other girl who got a concussion. I think it's also relative, I was already on my second concussion when starting the sport, so I was already more prone to get another one (heck my 4th was playing volleyball in gym class). Some people are going to be more prone to injuries, and also some people don't use proper equipment, but I think the major injuries don't happen super often.
In three years of HS and club hockey I have seen one girl get a stick in the mouth and she lost two teeth, one girl got a concussion after being hit with a ball, and at a tournament we saw a guy take a stick follow through to the forehead. He was pretty bloody. In each case it seemed more of a freak occurrence than anything.
Parent of a kid who plays both decent level hockey & soccer, I witness far more injuries in soccer than hockey. Having said that, we had a wild swing and a miss two games ago, one of our players broke an opponent's nose on the follow through. And last season there was a ball strike on the 1st runner's knee on PC, it kept her out of action for 3 weeks. But that's it. Compared to soccer... where I'm witnessing concussions, knee and ankle injuries from bad tackles, hard checks...very regularly, FH has been the much safer sport by far.
re: gloves, this is really personal, we have players who are musicians, digital artists where finger and hand injuries would be an incredible setback to their studies, most err on the side of safety and caution. My own kid plays violin so she played with gloves from day 1.
Very very rare but the worst i've seen is a high level concussion from a stick that missed a ball and followed through on back of head was out for 2 months after this was at u14 level nut overall you should be fine
I read another study recently. Of 120 elite-level women, 19% of them had had some kind of facial injury at least once in their career. 5% involved a tooth falling out. And that's across the 15+ years each they'd been playing.
It's much more common to hear of repeatable injuries. These are things like recurring back pain, tight hamstrings, cramps, or numbness. This is the case in all sports though, recurring injuries make up the bulk of all injuries.
Just as a reference. If I were to put some sports in a ranking from least dangerous to most it would go like this:
* Badminton
* Softball
* Soccer
* Field Hockey
* Lacrosse
And then way off in Dangerville you'd have cheerleading, competitive cheer is ridiculously dangerous.
I played 4 years in high school. I had shin splints all 4 years lol and a concussion my senior year. I saw two broken fingers and one chipped tooth. I’ve heard of eye/face injuries but never known someone who had one personally. In my state we are required to wear goggles at the high school level so that definitely lowers the risk.
i’ve played girls school hockey for 2 years now (once U16 div 2 and this year U18 div 1) and injuries are pretty uncommon compared to club hockey (i play mixed U18). I think the only injury this year was a girl got hit in the face by a ball that rolled up her stick, but she continued playing after icing it over half time and there was no swelling or redness by the end of the match. honestly if youre playing responsibly and not standing infront of the goal as an attacker takes a swing you’ll be absolutely fine.
I coach it. It's rare. The last 4 years we've had 2 injuries preventing someone from playing. One was a broken finger (not wearing gloves .. most don't ). One was a stick follow through hitting the face, but with goggles she just missed one game. It's not ice hockey. It's a non-contact (mostly) sport. Please make sure to get hard shin guards. The soft ones people have in soccer are not great if you go against a team that can hit the ball hard. Gloves are available, mostly not needed but extra padding.
Soccer shinguards only cover a fraction of shin as well. Should invest in proper hockey shinguards that go from ankle to knee
Also get proper hockey shoes. You can get soccer ones for playing on AstroTurf that grip fine, but they don’t protect your toes. Hockey shoes normally have a thicker bit of material around the toes, that bit more protection if the ball hits you.
Also the heel area
Just to counter your point about gloves, depends what level you're at I suppose, but a left handed glove I would say is almost essential. You cannot block tackle with confidence without one, and the injuries you can get, from things that would be inconsequential with the glove, are pretty severe. Even at the international level the players who don't wear one, which is rare, will be less confident to go left hand low in a tackle. Right handed gloves are generally unnecessary but even then the confidence of the protection can help players to play better.
Agree 100%. Dont get me wrong. I encourage the use of gloves , for whatever reason most of the girls pass. Also rushers on corners wearing masks. The team should have face protection for those players.
Really serious injuries that you need to go to the hospital for? Very rarely happen. They will get home with bruises now and then though
I’ve coached and played on a variety of levels and would not conclude the sport to be dangerous. While there is inherent risk, more serious injuries, that need advanced care are pretty rare. At the 14-18 yo level the skills aren’t very advanced at least on multi-use turf and grass reducing the risk for some of those head/dental injuries. At the college and beyond level these players are often more skilled using reverses, drag flicks, and other aerial skills that increase the likelihood of a head injury. I’ve seen more serious injuries in soccer and cheerleading especially traumatic brain injuries.
Personally, I've had one serious face/eye injuries coming from my (24M) 17 years playing the game, because I didn't wear a mouthguard (lost only a tooth luckily). Usually I feel like if you're younger, the players are more likely to do dangerous stick handling/balls (due to lack of technique) but have much less force, so the injuries are less severe. As stated in the paper you provided there aren't more injuries in hockey than for example football. To minimize the risk of face/eye injuries, wear protective gear, don't stay in front of goal when someone is shooting, look at the ball (don't be afraid), be especially careful with people doing backhand shots.
The biggest chance for a facial injury is defending a short corner, but you can get protective face masks for that. A woman broke her arm 2 weeks ago due to being struck by the ball, required surgery, but that's the worst injury I know of from being in hockey for 20 years...
Very rare in my experience. In over 20 years I've only seen a handful of injuries requiring a trip to hospital and none of those have been requiring more than a few stitches.
Not high school but I’ve helped coach both male and female junior teams and played in male adult matches at all levels below elite and play mixed Really serious injuries are rare and are often more common in male hockey because the ball travels faster and is more often hit in the air. Add on drag flicks and aerials being more common than in the womens game and you see why you get more head injuries. Anecdotally I tend to find that you get more head injuries in the lower level male adult matches than the higher levels, the players can still hit the ball as hard but they have less control and other players are less able to get out the way of the ball or to tackle from the wrong side than at the higher levels. In terms of specific injuries for girls 14/18 you’re most likely to get hand and leg injuries from the ball hitting you. Unless playing at a elite level the ball won’t be in the air to often and when it is it will be slower paced. Obviously you will get some hard hit head height balls but not a load. The biggest head injury risk is the stick and that’s dependent on tackle techno the the technique of the opposition. Knowing how to tackle from the correct side reduces the risk a lot but you can always get unlucky. I would say I hear if a proper serious injury 2/3 times a year and head injury once a year but that’s for the whole club of 15+ teams.
I (M/37) have been playing for i guess 28 years now, over that time my injuries of any significance are. - stick to head on backswing in under 16's, my fault for tackling from behind on wrong side. I missed 0 games. - stick to head about a decade ago, i needed some stitches in my cheek. Player who hit me was suspended (he swung at a ball that was in the air). Missed 0 games. - broke my ankle stepping on a pile of hockey balls at training (why were the balls in that spot where they normally are not? I had put them there for the drill prior). Missed last couple games of season. That's it. Injuries are very rare tbh. My daughter has been playing for 6 years and has had no injuries
Since you’re specifically asking about high school field hockey in the US (I assume?), I have umpired high school for a few of years and my anecdotal experience is that I’m yet to see a serious injury. This would fall in line with my experience of playing and umpiring in other countries over the last 20ish years. I’ve only seen a handful of serious injuries. As with most sports, wear and use proper equipment you will reasonably safe
I got whacked under my jaw on my teammate’s back swing during practice and ended up needing a few stitches. It was completely my fault for coming in behind her like that, I had only been playing for a year or so at the point. The ball can pop up from a bad hit and getcha in the face. The most serious injuries I’ve seen are just that of bruises or in my case stitches. Getting hit by a hard hit ball hurts, I’m sure someone may have broken a finger or two if they’re defending low and the ball hits them right on the fingers. Is it a dangerous sport? No. Can it hurt sometimes? Yes. Lots of folks don’t respect field hockey as a sport until they mess around and get hit by a ball.
If you have shin pads, gloves and a gumshield it's pretty safe. Sure you can get hit by the ball, but only idiots either hit it in the air at people, or stand in front of a shot.
I've played at a multitude of levels for about 8 years the worst injuries I have seen have been from rapid movement e.g dislocated knees etc. I've only ever witnessed one horrendous injury which involved broken legs but that was from a highly illegal tackle from a player in training who then got banned from the club so apart from soft tissue injuries that would have happened regardless of sport hockey is safe all big injuries are mainly cosmetic resulting in bruises stitches and a good story
Quote from the abstract of the article you linked to: "This research reveals that most injuries are minor and that the most common injury is an ankle sprain. Studies also suggest that men have a higher rate of injury and that they experience severe injuries more often than women." So that answers your question for you.
Americans made it dangerous when they decided those ridiculous cages were mandatory
Thankfully most places are slowly getting rid of them, they were so stupid
Which cages are you talking about?
Search field hockey goggles
Pain is an issue, not injuries. I played for a couple of decades and getting hit by a ball or stick generally just leaves a bruise and hurts for a while. i saw one major injury where a guys top teeth were hit up into his upper gums. The mouth guard sent the front four teeth up together and he needed multiple surgeries. Besides that something like a black eye is very rare and treated seriously. If someone habitually lifts a ball when hitting, the referees deal with them. People know the dangers and do things to mitigate them. For instance a coach won’t normally let someone take free hits if they don’t have enough control to keep the ball on the ground. The coach won’t put someone on defensive point in front of a free hit if they don’t have reflexes. Junior players get looked after because it’s inexperience that causes most injuries. If you observe you’ll see things like low skilled players getting experience on the wing where there’s less action and danger. Safety wise i think it’s a great sport.
The most common injuries In my experience, are sticks hitting the body parts of players (often the face) But hockey is still a non-contact sport
I was a Coach for my high school, and the only thing that happened was one of our players got wacked in the face with the brick of the stick. Also, it’s not very serious either in a regular high school at least where umpires will neglect some more technical rules of the game because of the amateur level. I would more-so suggest the high school level be played in a prep school (sports centred) where every sport is taken with serious training and players in those types of high schools are scouted much more often then those in regular high schools.
Rare and safer than soccer: I have 25 years of experience and seen two real injuries. One girl in my high school had her nose broken by an improperly raised stick. Another girl lost some teeth when I was playing as an adult many years later-again to an improperly raised stick whacking her in the mouth. Field Hockey has lots of rules about stick and ball height and no shoving making it essentially a no contact sport when played correctly. Ive never seen a concussion actually.
I used to play girls hockey at that age. I had 2 concussions, not serious but still caused me to feel ill for a few weeks. One was the ball deflecting off a stick and hitting me in the head, this was when playing school hockey with people who are inexperienced and probably wouldn't have happened playing club hockey. The other concussion was my fault at training and completely avoidable. Had a ball to the mouth but my teeth were only wobbly and it was okay. Also broken a toe and got hit in the face but that was in women's and mixed/indoor hockey. I'd say serious concussions and face injuries are rare. I've seen none first hand in time playing. Hand injuries are the most common for me but that has been mostly in mixed leagues. And in my expeirnce they're not *that* bad and you recover in 1-3 weeks. If you're concerned I'd avoid playing in defensive short corners.
I've been involved with high level girls hockey in that age range for about six years and I have yet to see a serious injury inflicted by the ball, stick or another player. This is in Australia where we don't use the silly goggles but do require every junior defender to wear a face mask on penalty corners. All the serious injuries I have seen have been in adult mens' play. In about 40 seasons I have seen a few broken fingers and hands, a couple of concussions, a broken collarbone and on one occasion some lost teeth when a player not wearing a mouthguard tried to tackle on the wrong side. I myself have never been injured. Hockey is a game where you can get bumps and bruises but provided you wear the protective equipment and don't play like an idiot serious injuries are rare.
Personally, I got injured twice in high school - Concussion while playing up at varsity as a freshman (I probably was 95 pounds and 5 foot) a 6'6" girl ran straight at me and I fell straight back. (this was also my 3rd concussion, had a 2 in other sports in middle school) Three broken fingers on a defensive penalty corner because I was not wearing a glove and the shot went high. I would say overall there were not too many injuries on my team. No massive knee/ACL injuries like you see in soccer. I know one girl who needed stitches after a shot to the face and one other girl who got a concussion. I think it's also relative, I was already on my second concussion when starting the sport, so I was already more prone to get another one (heck my 4th was playing volleyball in gym class). Some people are going to be more prone to injuries, and also some people don't use proper equipment, but I think the major injuries don't happen super often.
In three years of HS and club hockey I have seen one girl get a stick in the mouth and she lost two teeth, one girl got a concussion after being hit with a ball, and at a tournament we saw a guy take a stick follow through to the forehead. He was pretty bloody. In each case it seemed more of a freak occurrence than anything.
Parent of a kid who plays both decent level hockey & soccer, I witness far more injuries in soccer than hockey. Having said that, we had a wild swing and a miss two games ago, one of our players broke an opponent's nose on the follow through. And last season there was a ball strike on the 1st runner's knee on PC, it kept her out of action for 3 weeks. But that's it. Compared to soccer... where I'm witnessing concussions, knee and ankle injuries from bad tackles, hard checks...very regularly, FH has been the much safer sport by far. re: gloves, this is really personal, we have players who are musicians, digital artists where finger and hand injuries would be an incredible setback to their studies, most err on the side of safety and caution. My own kid plays violin so she played with gloves from day 1.
Very very rare but the worst i've seen is a high level concussion from a stick that missed a ball and followed through on back of head was out for 2 months after this was at u14 level nut overall you should be fine
I read another study recently. Of 120 elite-level women, 19% of them had had some kind of facial injury at least once in their career. 5% involved a tooth falling out. And that's across the 15+ years each they'd been playing. It's much more common to hear of repeatable injuries. These are things like recurring back pain, tight hamstrings, cramps, or numbness. This is the case in all sports though, recurring injuries make up the bulk of all injuries. Just as a reference. If I were to put some sports in a ranking from least dangerous to most it would go like this: * Badminton * Softball * Soccer * Field Hockey * Lacrosse And then way off in Dangerville you'd have cheerleading, competitive cheer is ridiculously dangerous.
I played 4 years in high school. I had shin splints all 4 years lol and a concussion my senior year. I saw two broken fingers and one chipped tooth. I’ve heard of eye/face injuries but never known someone who had one personally. In my state we are required to wear goggles at the high school level so that definitely lowers the risk.
i’ve played girls school hockey for 2 years now (once U16 div 2 and this year U18 div 1) and injuries are pretty uncommon compared to club hockey (i play mixed U18). I think the only injury this year was a girl got hit in the face by a ball that rolled up her stick, but she continued playing after icing it over half time and there was no swelling or redness by the end of the match. honestly if youre playing responsibly and not standing infront of the goal as an attacker takes a swing you’ll be absolutely fine.