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The Record

HOCKEY CHAMPIONSHIP THE FIRST WITHOUT MALE REFEREES, LINESMEN
                                    
By Steve Cannon Record staff
Coach Shannon Miller, a Calgary police officer who now walks a
beatbehinda hockeybench, may be the law in TeamCanada's dressing
room.But on the ice this week,thereferees and"linesmen"still have the
final word.

And for the first time ever at the Women's World Hockey Championship,
there are no male sheriffs on the payroll.

"I absolutely agree with doing it this way," Canadian referee Marina
Zenk said Tuesday of the fact all 15 on-ice officials in Kitchener
this week are women.

"We have a great program (for training officials) in Canada. I'm not
sure what it's like for some of the Europeans, so this gives them an
opportunity to work at a higher level."

According to Bob Nadin, the tournament's head of officials, male
referees were swept aside so female officials could develop their
skills at the same rate as the players.

But that's not the only reason.

"We had problems in the past. Some of the men (officials) were not
putting out 100 per cent," Nadin said at a February press conference
in Kitchener.

Clearly, that's not the case with the women selected to keep the peace
among the eight nations here this week. Like the players, they see
this as their shot to prove they have what it takes to participate in
an Olympic Games.

And like the players, their paths to Kitchener have been long and
varied.

Canadian referee Laurie Taylor-Bolton, for instance, is a police
officer in real life. Zenk works for an Ottawa computer company.

Most officials, like Hungarian lineswoman Eszter Vores, are, or were,
players themselves and appreciate the subtleties that make the women's
game stand on its own.

"I prefer (the) women's (games)," said Vores, 21, a university
student, television technician and member of Hungary's national
women's team.

"Men's (games are) too difficult for me," she said, laughing at the
memory of blinding slapshots that whizzed by too close for her liking.


If fans are quick to spot the differences between men's and women's
hockey, those differences are magnified for the people charged with
keeping a lid on the on-ice hostilities.

"The intensity is there, but overall the men's game is rougher because
of the body checking," Nadin said in an interview.

"There are also, in the men's game, more of what we call scrums. I'm
not saying the women's game can't get rough because it clearly can."

Zenk, who has refereed both men's and women's hockey for 13 years,
said she's never altered her approach when calling games for either
gender. She does not drop the hammer on the men, nor soft-pedal with
the women.

That's not to say the players approach it the same way, however.

"The women treat the game differently, there's more respect, more
sportsmanship. There's a lot more fair play," Zenk said.

"I still do boys' hockey and you still get a lot of that stuff after
the whistle. You don't get as much lip at this level from the women.
Some of the guys can't wait to get that last punch in.

"I'm not sure why that is. Maybe it has something to do with
hormones."

Tournament organizers realized they were taking a bit of gamble by
keeping experienced male referees out of the loop in order to season
their female counterparts.

But after two days of competition, no one has voiced any concerns, at
least not publicly. Zenk, for one, isn't expecting any fallout.

"In my opinion, it's irrelevant if you have men or women" working
games, Zenk said. "We have capable linesmen here who are here because
they do an excellent job. That's all that matters."

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Kitchener-Waterloo Record 1997 Kitchener-Waterloo Record Online