Anyone else experienced guys being extra aggressive with female players?
I’m an adult female player, playing rec league in a women’s C-league and a coed D-league. Women’s league is very chill, but in coed I feel like some of the players are really obnoxious to female players. Is this normal/are there any solutions for it?
For example, I played D in a game last weekend where one specific dude (winger) was on my case the entire time. The puck would be nowhere near us and he’d be aggressively stick lifting me—and not just one lift, but like repeatedly wrenching my stick above my head and trying to stay entangled until I could wrench away. He also was skating up and ramming his shoulder into me randomly, again puck nowhere near us. Also rammed me into the boards a couple times. My team was already losing and none of this seemed to benefit him/his team at all.
Ive also had guys seemingly go out of their way to just run into me head on as their “defense” strategy. They don’t often do this with the guys, as far as I can tell. I’ve talked to other female players in my league and they think the players ram into us because we’re smaller and they know they can bully us more than the guys.
My female friend who played hockey with guys growing up said the men on my team should have my back there, but they don’t 🤷♀️
It’s genuinely so annoying that I’m debating dropping coed next season and just doing women’s league. The vibes of women’s league are way better, but I do like the faster play in coed and extra game per week in general.
Anyone have any insight on any solutions to this?