Students involved in intramural sports are feeling pressure as the rule of equal genders playing during the game is being enforced this year, forcing many women to play throughout the game without breaks, while men are able to swap out throughout the game.

Though DU’s intramural sports have required that the same number of females play on the field during a game as males since 2005, these rules seem to be new. Daniel Wahl, the assistant director of programing at the Ritchie Center, has credited the new attention the rules are receiving to two sources.

The first reason, Wahl suggested, is that the rules are beginning to actually be enforced. In past years, the rules have not been implemented at the beginning of the season, making it difficult to enforce them later on in the year.

“The intramural sports staff is better trained this year, and the rules are being enforced from the start of the season,” said Wahl.  

Wahl believes the second fact is that the attendance of team captains at captain meetings, which has produced an effect on the understanding of the rules. This year team captains have not been attending these meetings as regularly as in the past, resulting in less understanding of the intramural sports rules.

“When the rules are enforced at a game, they come as a surprise,” said Wahl.

Broomball rules state that “a team consists of five players  CoRec: two men, two women and a goalie of either sex.”

Soccer rules state that “for Co-Rec games, a team must have at least two women, plus a goalkeeper of either gender, on the court at all times.”

Volleyball’s rules have CoRec modifications stating that “there cannot be more males on the floor than females.”

The participation in intramural sport involvement is split as 70 percent men and 30 percent women. This greatly contrasts the admission statistics at DU, which are 54 percent female and 46 percent male.

“We absolutely feel that female representation in intramural sports has more room to grow and be more representative of our student population,” said Wahl.

Shannon Reimers, a participant in CoRec intramural soccer, believes that while it is good to make the co-ed teams fair, it is difficult for the girls playing the sport. Due to a significantly lower number of girls on the team, they are often forced to play the entire game with no breaks in order to keep up with the intramural sports regulations.

“It would be nice to be able to rotate in guys for girls if enough girls don’t show up for that specific game,” said Reimers. “Maybe the intramural leagues should think about allowing a certain number of games per season that a team could play with no girls.”