She’s the endangered species of pick-up basketball: “that girl.” The lone female brave enough to rough it with all the Allen Iverson wannabes and Larry Bird look-alikes, she’ll wait her turn with everyone else just so she can get a little run. She’s usually better than half of the hairy, sweaty guys on the floor, but most times you’d never know it. For the drop of estrogen in an ocean of testosterone, earning respect on the court is tough. Touching the ball every few possessions would be nice, but at the same time, special treatment is an insult. Don’t go easy on these chicks.
Lindsay Amstutz, a 2006 graduate of Georgetown Law and now a business developer for the WNBA, was that girl. Now she’s the president and founder of the Lady Lawyers Basketball League—a D.C.-based league born just two years ago that now includes 550 members nation-wide and holds tournaments in cities from Washington to San Francisco and Los Angeles. On Saturday the league held its third-annual Get In The Game tournament at Yates Fieldhouse in an effort to attract new members from the D.C. area.
“I was shooting around alone one day in the law school’s gym and thought that there’s got to be other women who want to play,” Amstutz said. “It’s no fun to always be that one girl, so the goal was to get all of those “one girls” and bring them together.”
Amstutz’s brainchild has done just that. Women from all over the country who have settled in D.C. come together a couple times a week to play the game they love. Some haven’t played since high school, while some are former college athletes. One participant had her number retired by the University of Virginia to honor her outstanding college career. For others, the most organized form of basketball they had ever played in the past was on the street against the boys on their block.
The mishmash of players has formed a kind of family where everyone calls the court home, whether they’re working on their zone defense or the defense of a client.
When they go to play in a league game or a tournament, like the one last weekend, the ladies use it as a time to socialize and exercise, of course. But there’s more than sweat and elbows being traded in the low post at these events: the business cards and phone numbers of these women are passed back and forth like they’re running a weave drill. Networking has become an important perk for young law students and lawyers looking to participate in the league.
“What happens is there are a lot of great jobs that just aren’t publicized,” vice-president of the league, Jennifer Schwab (LAW ’02) said. “So much of it is done by word of mouth and there are a lot of people who have gotten jobs because of people they met in the league.”
The younger players also have the benefit of playing alongside potential mentors as they work through the stress that comes with a stint in law school. But the league is helping more than just the green lawyers fresh off the bar and the students freaked out by the Socratic Method.
Just last week the league became an official non-profit organization, taking donations and using their sponsorships from various local law firms to make donations to charity. This year the league is supporting Suited For Change, a group that provides professional clothing, job training and résumé building for low-income women in the D.C. area.
“It’s the best part of the league,” Tamica Daniel, a student in both the Georgetown Law and Policy schools said. “We have a moral duty to help out those that are underserved.” It’s this kind of off-court assist that many of the women value. As Daniel concluded, “It’s good to feel like we’re involved in the community helping out women who might not have as much as we do.”
