Court Opinion

ID: 9484480
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:54:40.589199+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:16.277629
License: Public Domain

SCIRICA, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I join in the court’s opinion, but write separately because I believe the rules of field hockey and conclusory opinions set forth in affidavits submitted by Williams do not create a genuine issue of material fact on whether field hockey is a contact sport. Had the school district moved for summary judgment on the Title IX claim on this record,11 would have granted it.
This dispute centers on whether a “major activity” of field hockey involves bodily contact. Williams contends field hockey is not a contact sport because its rules penalize players who raise their sticks, charge, push, trip, or personally handle an opponent, or engage in “rough or dangerous play,” Nat’l Fed’n of State High Sch. Ass’n, Field Hockey Rules 16-17, 24-25 (1990-91).2 In support, Williams produced the affidavits of four experts, each of whom stated:
Field hockey is technically, and according to the Rules of the Game of Hockey, a non-contact sport.
Unlike sports like boxing, wrestling, rugby, ice hockey, football and basketball, field hockey does not involve contact as its purpose or major activity.
(emphasis added).
Whether field hockey is a contact sport cannot turn solely on the rules.3 The focus must be on the realities of play. High school basketball rules forbid a player from “holding], push[ing], trip[ping,] [ ]or impeding,] the progress of an opponent.” Nat’l Fed’n of State High Sch. Ass’n, Basketball Rules at 52-53 (1990).4 Yet basketball is a contact sport and is cited as such in 34 C.F.R. § 106.41(b). Although basketball’s rules penalize charging into an opponent, collisions occur as players compete for possession of the ball. Similarly, in field hockey, players compete for possession of the ball. Collisions occur and, for purposes of § 106.-41(b), it is of little consequence that such conduct violates the rules. That contact is penalized cannot be dispositive.
*181Williams’ experts’ conclusions that “field hockey does not involve contact as its ... major activity” contains another flaw; As the majority observes, at 173, there is a subtle but significant difference between asking whether “field hockey ... involve[s] contact as its major ... activity,” the language used in Williams’ affidavits, and asking whether “the major activity of [field hockey] involves bodily contact,” the language used in § 106.41(b). Major activities of field hockey include running, advancing the ball, checking, shooting and blocking. These activities inevitably involve bodily contact.
In remarkable contrast to Williams’ affi-ants, the School District’s affiants emphasized the realities of the game. Vonnie Gros, a veteran coach and player,5 testified;
The major activities of the sport of field hockey includ[e] running up and down the field in order to move the ball towards the opponent’s goal or to prevent the opposing team from doing so. These activities inevitably produce and involve bodily contact, as players compete at close quarters for possession or control of the ball. Although physical contact is in most cases a violation of the rules for which the official has the option of calling a penalty, such contact regularly occurs throughout the course of any competitive game. Because its major activities involve bodily contact, I consider field hockey to be a “contact sport.” Field hockey certainly cannot be called a “non-contact” sport.
Similarly, Dominie Villani, Director of Athletics at Liberty High School, stated that players positioning for the ball will “bump [and] joust_ [in] a small area. So there is [sic] going to be collisions.” Based on twenty-seven years of coaching experience Villani testified:
[Y]ou know, [as a player] I have every right to that ball as the opponent does and I am going to use any skills and natural attributes of power, speed and strength ... to get to that ball. And because of the nature of the game, there is going to be contact. There is contact.
And I would make the analogy, as Title IX does, they label basketball as a contact sport. And I have observed many basketball games, and I have observed a number of field hockey games. And taken in that context, field hockey — girls’ field hockey would definitely be a contact sport.
The girls’ field hockey coach, Martin Romer-il, also emphasized the realities of the game:
There is contact in field hockey because you have players occupying potentially the same space. This would happen in any sport when two players want to occupy the same space, obviously, there’s going to be contact so there is some contact in field hockey.
As the majority observes, the “affidavits on behalf of Williams merely asserted a conclusion without any reference to actual activity during play.” At 173. In my view, this evidence fails to create a genuine issue of material fact.

. Of course, once a motion for summary judgment is filed, the adverse party may respond under Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(e).

. In rejecting the School District’s argument that field hockey is a contact sport, the district court held 34 C.F.R. § 106.41(b)’s failure to include field hockey among its examples of contact sports "suggested] that this sport was not recognized as a contact sport when the rule was drafted.” But the textual examples in the regulation are illustrative, not inclusive. The regulation does not mention other contact sports such as lacrosse, soccer, and water polo. See 34 C.F.R. § 106.41(b) ("contact sports include boxing, wrestling, rugby, ice hockey, football, basketball and other sports the purpose or major activity of which involves bodily contact”).

. The district court held: "[i]t defies logic to conclude that bodily contact is a purpose or major activity of field hockey when a team may be penalized not only when its players or a ball hit by one of its players contacts another player, but also when such contact is threatened or likely.”

. The basketball rules are part of this record.

. As the majority notes, Gros coached the U.S. Womens’ Olympic Field Hockey Team from 1977 to 1984.