Monty Aldous, club development coordinator, along with Megan Jewell, with Ringette Canada’s heritage outreach program, were in town last week introducing school children to the sport of ringette.
Ringette, along with basketball, lacrosse and five-pin bowling were designated as heritage sports five years ago.
These are sports that were developed in Canada, unique to Canada and perfected in Canada.
Part of the initiative put funding into place to promote, develop and encourage youth participation in heritage sports.
Ringette was developed in 1963 by Sam Jacks, a recreation director from North Bay, Ont., Aldous explained.
“He was looking for a sport girls could play on ice,” he said.
Jacks looked to floor hockey for inspiration, came up with the rubber ring and then established certain rules that make ringette unique, similar to hockey, but at the same time very different.
Because it is played with a ring, the sport of ringette is often described as a possession game.
To avoid a single player from dominating a game, Aldous explained, Jacks put rules into place to encourage participation by all players and to give each team a fair chance at being on the attack.
The most critical of these rules is a player can’t bring the ring across the blue line, but rather must pass the ring to a teammate over the blueline.
What also adds to the possession aspect of the game is the shot clock, such that each team has 30 seconds to record a shot on goal, otherwise possession is transferred to the opposing team.
As part of the heritage outreach program, Aldous and Jewell visit schools and show children a short video explaining the basics of ringette and then put them through a few drills and then get them to play a short game.
The Grade 2 and 3 students at Parkland elementary school certainly seemed to be enjoying themselves last Friday.
“The reception is universally awesome,” Aldous said.
Like hockey and most other sports, ringette is practiced at various levels across Canada, from recreation to elite, with recreational leagues, to university, provincial and national teams.
In fact, Aldous said, Canada has won the world championships three times.
“Our greatest rival is Finland,” Aldous said.
“They’ve also won the world championship three times.”
Despite the popularity of ringette, the likelihood the sport will be accepted as an Olympic sport, at least for the moment, is slim, Aldous said.
“The road block is at the moment ringette is predominantly a single gender sport,” he explained.
“The International Olympic Committee is not accepting any applications from sports that are single gender.”
Aldous did say ringette associations across Canada are working hard at trying to include more boys in ringette.
Aldous did admit that recruiting boys into a sport initially designed for girls does meet with some opposition, including the girls.
“The girls do enjoy it is a single gender sport and we need to keep that in mind as we grow,” he said.