“Oh, you can use your hands? That changes everything!”
Lacrosse and hurling are like estranged brothers.
They’re both hard-hitting, they’re both frantic and they both require tremendous stick work.
Both are steeped in long, long history as well, each apparently used as an alternative to battle way back when.
But some of our transatlantic neighbours have been sampling the fastest field sport on the planet as a substitute to their own first love, lacrosse, and it’s safe to say that they’re convinced. They get it.
With some American high schools adding GAA to their PE curriculum, hurling is taking off in Canada now.
Dublin man David Wogan has been living in Toronto for three years now and he took it upon himself to teach some of University of Toronto’s lacrosse team the beautiful game.
“Every time I play hurling, I instantly get talking to a local Torontonian eager to learn more about the sport,” Wogan spoke with SportsJOE. “I wanted to get Canadian athletes to try hurling, so I reached out to the University of Toronto lacrosse teams and they were naturals at it.
“They even talked about starting a tournament at the university: ‘If you told everyone to come we could get a huge club going here. Anyone who has a stick in their hand or a ball on the ground could basically pick it up. We were hoping to get a game going, if we can get enough sticks together.'”
More converts!
David Wogan created Play Hurling with the goal of spreading the sport to a global audience using video content.
