As one of the fastest growing female sports on campus, the UW women’s lacrosse club team has built a squad of 35 athletes. The team travels the country to compete against teams from Tulane, Illinois, Purdue, the University of Minnesota-Duluth and the University of Chicago.

The women’s lacrosse season runs from the team’s first tournament in February to the national tournament in late spring.

There is currently not an official NCAA varsity team offered in women’s lacrosse at Wisconsin, so the club team is the only option available for prospective UW women’s lacrosse players. As a result, the women’s lacrosse team receives about $900 a year from the university, which is a standard level of funding for a club team. To raise the rest of the money needed to run the team effectively, members of the club run fundraisers and are forced to cover many of the costs themselves.

“Our uniforms are getting older and need to be replaced,” team member Lauren Hankey said. “Our players sometimes have to share uniforms by changing from one player to another when they run off the field. The fact of the matter is that each year, we get more and more girls coming out for the team. So the interest of women’s lacrosse is growing, but our funds are slowly diminishing. Without adequate funding, individual player fees will have to be raised so high that some girls won’t be able to afford to play anymore. With a little more help from the university than the mere $900 a year, this team has the possibility to grow into something great.”

Despite their current financial situation, the women’s lacrosse team was able to compile a record of 6-5 playing against some of the toughest competition in the country. Driven by the desire to give women at UW-Madison an environment where they can continue to play lacrosse in their college years, the women’s lacrosse team is a club that is on the rise and looking to make an impact on the national level.