Many people think that hockey is a man’s sport, but over the years it has become a popular sport for females. The North Point hockey team, which is joined with Thomas Stone and Westlake’s, is now picking up on this trend. This year, the team got its first female hockey player, Kira Maginnis, who is a freshman.

Maginnis is a goalie on the team. She has been playing hockey for eight years. “I grew up watching the Washington Capitals and watching my brother play and it looked like more fun than figure skating so I tried it and liked it,” she said.

Maginnis was playing defense when she started, but switched to goalie when she was eight years old. As a goalie she has had a few shutouts, but she can’t remember the exact number. A shutout is when the goal keeper lets in no goals for the whole game.

With hockey being a male dominated sport, Maginnis still enjoys it. “It’s really fun. The boys always mess around and treat me just like anyone else.” Even with the increase of females playing hockey, males still have a certain mentality when they see a girl on the team. “Other teams say ‘look it’s a girl, this should be easy,’ but playing (well) earns their respect fast,” Maginnis commented.

Maginnis doesn’t just play with the boys. She ‘s a member of an all-girls hockey team in Northern Virginia, which has a different atmosphere from the school team with all boys. On the all-girls team there is no checking (when a player bump an opponent into the boards), so there are a lot less injuries. “(The) High school (team) is a lot faster paced than (the) girls’,” added Maginnis.

A twist to playing on the school team with all-boys is that her older brother, Conor Maginnis (’12), also plays on the team. The experience is pretty fun for Kira. “We have our sibling fights, but he is my defenseman, so it is his job to protect me,” she added. “But after the games we go back to making fun of each other.”

Conor enjoys playing on the team with his younger sister. “It’s nice because we’ve been playing for years, but never together,” said Conor. It is different for them though. “It’s nice to have a sibling rivalry on the team, because it pushes us to try to one up each other and forces us to get better,”  he added.

Many people would be wary about playing with people who they don’t go to school with for a “school sports team”, but that isn’t the case for Kira. “They’re really funny. Our team is probably the funniest group of guys I have ever met,” commented Kira. She already knew some of the boys on the team. “I knew them because of my travel team or I know their siblings,” she added.

Kira said her ideal hockey player is Olie Kolzig. “He was the person I watched and over the years decided that one day I wanted to play like him.”