A female counterpart to the currently all-male President’s Cup inter-dorm softball tournament looks to add a new dynamic to Memorial Field this spring. Julie Bauer ’10, sick of being “expected to hang around and watch the boys be athletic,” and science teacher Julie Oxborough have been working with activities coordinator James Yanelli to organize the contest, which should begin on May 1st.
The coordinators of the girls’ P-cup hope to preserve many elements of the boys’ program. “It’s working well for the boys, why reinvent [it]?” asked Bauer, who hopes the boys’ “commissioners” will meet with the girls to explain their system. She hopes that the girls’ contest will be “exactly like” the boys’, including a similar statistics website. Ms. Oxborough praised the boys’ self-governance and hopes that the girls follow this example. The plan is for at least four dorms to compete in a double elimination competition; day students may join dormitory teams or form their own. Mr. Yanelli is currently helping Bauer and Ms. Oxborough to negotiate use of Memorial Field with the boys. Bauer likes the idea of using “the same field, where people congregate a lot,” but she acknowledges that the girls and boys might need to alternate using another field.
Most of the Choate community is open to the creation of a female competition. Biology teacher Sarah Perkin believed that the program would be “in the spirit of…trying to get people to interact,” although she also suggested, “I think it would be interesting to have a P-Cup cricket match!” Varsity softball player Katie Rogers ’10 thought that “a girls’ P-cup tournament would be a great idea. I know that it would catch on with the girl softball players, and I’m sure that other girl athletes are sick of just watching boys play from the sidelines.”
However, the reactions of male students are mixed. Ms. Oxborough was optimistic: when asked about the boys’ reaction, she exclaimed “I would expect it to be wonderful!” She later acknowledged that boys might think “we are ‘cramping their style,’” but even if they might feel disappointed at first, “they know better, deep down.” Bauer admits, “I don’t think the boys will be happy to share their field.” While Adi Rajagopalan ’09 would “probably stop by” to watch a game, some boys expressed no interest. An anonymous boy was protective of the male competition and suggested that Bauer “start a new league with a completely different sport—for example, volleyball; that will not only preserve the boys’ tradition [of P-Cup] but also allow the girls to have fun!” Ms. Oxborough sees no reason for boys to object, because a female dormitory softball competition did in fact exist in the 1980s and ’90s, a fact that surprised many of the boys interviewed and caused some to change their views.
Faculty member James Davidson remembers this old contest, which Ms. Oxborough herself participated in, as part of a larger intramural sports competition. The President’s Cup originally included a multitude of year round intramural sports leagues, the balance of which have “fallen by the boards.” Girls’ softball was one of the available sports, and participation typically included eight to ten teams. “It was never as popular [as boys’ softball],” Davidson said, “But the kids who participated enjoyed it. It was very successful for those who really took softball and sports seriously.” Davidson noted that the dorms that dominated usually had the largest number of softball players. The girls’ softball competition may have garnered less attention because “girls were athletically very competitive in the sport they signed up for.”
Those such as Ms. Oxborough who thoroughly enjoyed “girls’ P-Cup” were “saddened it died” when one class did not organize a league. “I hope the girls have fun! [and] I hope it will never die again,” she said passionately. Davidson thinks that the program is most likely to succeed “if the softball girls are interested in getting behind it.”
