Growing the Greatest Game

Growing the Greatest Game is a national initiative to sustainably grow field hockey with inclusion and diversity at its core.  

We aim to grow the game through 20 diverse grassroots sites in 2020-2021 (moved to 2022 due to the continuing uncertainty of Covid-19) with support from colleges and clubs to build long term pipelines. See our confirmed sites 

By year two, we have big goals of introducing the sport to 1,000 traditionally underrepresented athletes at 50 sites! 

While field hockey has grown at the youth, club and high school levels, we would be remiss to not acknowledge the lack of diversity in that growth. As a result, only 2.5% of field hockey athletes identify as Black in the NCAA. Rather than hang our heads about where we are, we choose to envision what we can be.  Let's make the game available for all! 

What does your donation do? 
$100 covers the the registration cost of one athlete
$2 buys a ball for an athlete to take home.
$10 buys a stick for 1 athlete.
$20 buys all cones and gear, whistles, etc needed to run the site. 
$75 covers end of season awards for all 20 athletes
$250 covers coach training and certification for one sites staff 

Each site costs approx $2,000 to run a free play day(s) with a 6 week spring season.  

ANY size donation covers for the fun stuff (think gear and goodies) but also ensures we train coaches in inclusion and youth coaching,  get letters of inspiration and gear from colleges to give to all athletes, plus all the boring, but important stuff (insurance and admin and rental fees.) 

Who is leading this initiative?
Four different organizational directors have come together to ensure this plan's success: Meghan Stocks (So Field Hockey ), Imani Ruffin (Sistas with Stix ), Shari Jones, Idrienne Walker, Janessa Pope (Stepping into Field Hockey ) & Chrissy Summers (Beyond Sticks ).  

As Marian Wright Edelman coined, "You can't be what you can't see".   Thank you for envisioning a more inclusive future with us. Let's go play!