Cold shoulder

Sandwich boys head to Boston for final while playing at the Garden remains just a dream for state's best girls teams.

Hingham High captains (from left) Meg Findley, Stephanie Schlosky, Laura Levin, and Emily Jennings will play for the Division 2 state crown tomorrow at Harvard’s Bright Center. (Globe Staff Photo / Matthew J. Lee)

Bruins great Bobby Orr is Stephanie Schlosky's favorite hockey player. A forward on the Hingham High girls' team, Schlosky has written school essays about the former defenseman. Her teammate, Emily Jennings, wears No. 4 because of Orr.

They have seen his number hanging from the rafters of the TD Banknorth Garden. And this week, high school hockey players will get a chance to play in the same facility as the Bruins.

Those that play on a boys' team, that is.

Sunday, eight boys' teams will square off in four Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association state final games at the Garden. Tomorrow, Schlosky and Jennings will join their Hingham teammates as one of four girls' teams to play in the MIAA's Division 1 and Division 2 state finals at Harvard University's Bright Center.

"It's kind of like you have an awesome bowl of ice cream and a wicked bowl of ice cream," Schlosky said. "Harvard would be really good, but the Garden would be one notch above."

In Massachusetts, 87 schools ran girls' hockey teams last season, second in the country behind Minnesota (267 programs). In comparison, boys' hockey was played at 282 Massachusetts schools. Since girls' hockey fell under the MIAA umbrella in 2000, participation has more than doubled.

The MIAA has paid close attention to the sport's growth by adjusting tournament alignments and sites. And as participation increases, area coaches and administrators believe it is time for girls' hockey to be included at the Garden with the boys.

Bourne High principal Ron McCarthy does not have a girls' hockey team at his school, yet he has been a vocal advocate for moving the girls' state finals to the Garden. Three years ago, he took his daughter to a boys' state final game at the Garden, and afterward she asked why the girls don't play at the same place.

McCarthy said he didn't have an answer and began writing letters to the MIAA. Girls' and boys' basketball teams both have played at the Garden during the postseason for more than 15 years.

"It just seems like [girls' hockey] is the one entity that is left out of what is the best venue for indoor athletics in Massachusetts," McCarthy said.

Before this season, MIAA officials said they had not heard complaints from coaches or athletic directors about the setup of the girls' hockey final, but they will be open to suggestions at the ice hockey committee meeting at the end of the season, deputy director Bill Gaine said.

Earlier this year, Hingham assistant coach Hugh Gorman's daughters, who are not on the team, drafted a petition requesting the finals be moved to the Garden next season. They received more than 140 signatures, but that was among the first movements for action.

Gaine said he believes a facility such as Bright Center, with a seating capacity of about 2,800, provides a suitable atmosphere for the estimated 2,000 fans who attended last season's Division 1 and Division 2 girls' championship games. (According to the MIAA, about 25,000 fans watched the four boys' games last season.)

Hingham High principal Paula Girouard McCann agrees with all the positives surrounding the girls' venue, but she is concerned that this is a fairness issue.

"Harvard is a great venue, but all of the games are not at Harvard," she said. "Maybe if all of the games were there, it would be wonderful, but they're not."

Title IX question

Despite the different sites, Lincoln-Sudbury athletic director Nancy O'Neil maintains the MIAA is not in violation of Title IX. She is a member of the MIAA ice hockey committee and has been active in helping structure the girls' tournament.

"If the experience at Harvard was shabby, if the school was a poor facility and the environment for spectators was lousy, then I would say we have a problem on our hands," O'Neil said. "I would rather have my team play there than in the Garden, but I understand the history and the emotions a facility like the Garden brings out in people."

However, there is more to consider when dealing with Title IX than what you can see, said Jocelyn Samuels, an attorney and the vice president for education and employment at the National Women's Law Center in Washington.

"The question is not simply whether the girls have a serviceable facility, because there is significantly more that goes into an assessment of the quality than simply the four walls of the building they play in," Samuels said. "Playing in the Bruins' home arena can carry with it an association that there are professional sports played here, and these sports are to be taken seriously. Perhaps more people will come because there are more amenities and concession stands. Playing in the Bruins' arena may add to the prestige and excitement of the hockey game.

"All of these intangible things are also relevant in whether or not this is a violation."

A simple test may be to ask the following question, Samuels said.

"Would the boys be equally happy playing at the Harvard arena? If not, then you have a pretty good indication that there is an advantage to playing at the Bruins' arena."

St. Mary's of Lynn coach Frank Pagliuca, whose team will be in the Div. 1 final tomorrow against Wakefield, said he likes the atmosphere at Harvard and it is appropriate for a growing sport.

"It takes a while for towns to develop a program, and once that happens, I think you're going to see the level of competition rise," Pagliuca said. "I think down the road everybody would like to see them have an opportunity to play at the Garden."

But playing at the Garden comes with many questions. Will all the games be held in one day starting at 8 a.m.? Would teams split venues? Would the Garden provide an extra day?

Braintree High girls' coach Kevin Burchill said his 8-year-old daughter has played at the Garden twice before Bruins games as part of her recreational team, and he hopes by the time she is in high school she will have that chance again.

"These are valid reasons, but let's put some thinking caps on and try to do it," Burchill said.

Venue considerations

Under the current agreement, the Garden is provided to the MIAA rent free, with the MIAA and the Garden splitting ticket revenue.

Venues can be a sore subject at all levels of the tournament for the boys and the girls. Gaine said that after the first round of the MIAA's elite Super 8 boys' tournament was moved to the DCU Center in Worcester he received numerous complaints about the distance. He also said it had the lowest attendance in the tournament's history.

The MIAA is at the mercy of the venues, according to Concord-Carlisle athletic director Barry Haley, who is in charge of scheduling sites for Division 1 girls' and the North boys' sectional. He said sites are determined a year in advance, but location, opponents, and availability make scheduling a juggling act.

This season, the girls' Division 2 quarterfinals were at the University of Massachusetts at Boston. Plans were to return to the rink for the girls' state semifinals, but the men's hockey team was playing in its conference tournament.

As a result, the semifinals were moved to a rink in Canton. Milton coach Christine Gurskis was disappointed by that news - she took her team to the state final last year at Harvard and had no complaints, but she did not find Canton's rink acceptable for a playoff game.

"I feel like the higher you go in the tournament, the better the facility should be," Gurskis said. "You don't get to see that until the finals."

Tomorrow, Hingham, Milton, Wakefield, and St. Mary's will play for a state title. And according to Jennings, that is the focus.

"It's going to be about winning a state championship," she said. "All we really want is that cup in our hands."

Hingham coach Tom Findley has two daughters, Beth, a freshman, and Meg, a senior, on his team. He's disappointed Meg "will never be able to have that experience of playing at the Garden, whereas if she were a boy, she would be at the Garden."

Monique Walker can be reached at mwalker@globe.com