
Joe - stock.adobe.com
Young athletes making amazing plays while playing Lacrosse
It’s been a rough year for sports leagues in 2020. Games have been canceled or postponed, and fans are locked out of stadiums. Despite that environment, in July the National Lacrosse League announced a new North Texas franchise calling Fort Worth home. There’s no team name yet, but plans call for a team to compete in the league’s next season.
While North Texans may not be as familiar with a stick and ball as goal posts and pigskins, team majority owner Bill Cameron and managing partner Greg Bibb believe fans will enjoy the game’s fast pace, high scoring, and physicality. Cameron is a partial owner of the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder and lead owner and chairman of the WNBA’s Dallas Wings. Bibb serves as CEO of the Wings after a long career in executive roles with professional sports franchises. Friends and business partners for several years, they see Fort Worth as a nice opportunity for a franchise.
“We wanted to build a sports entertainment company that extended well beyond one sports property,” Bibb says. “About two years [ago], I started to look at potential opportunities and quickly came to realize the National Lacrosse League was the league that provided the best opportunities for us and checked the most boxes for us in terms of the next team in our portfolio.”
Team officials are banking on much of the coronavirus pandemic to have subsided by the start of the next NLL season in November 2021. Bibb and Cameron were further along in organizing a franchise earlier this year but paused to see how the pandemic played out. With the announcement, they’re now ready to move forward and hope Fort Worth sports fans embrace the franchise.
“We’re excited to bring this to North Texas and want to represent North Texas,” Bibb says, “but we really want Fort Worth sports fans to feel like this is their team.”

JAMES BOARDMAN Jim - stock.adobe.com
Boys lacrosse stick and helmet
AN ACTION-PACKED, GROWING GAME
In a football-crazed area, Bibb and Cameron believe professional lacrosse can find a fanbase. Lacrosse features plenty of fast-paced action similar to hockey. Traditionally an outdoor game, the NLL plays a version called “box lacrosse.” The game is played inside on an artificial turf surface complete with glass and boards as in hockey. There are also power players, free substitutions, and plenty of hitting.
Each team plays with five runners (field players) and a goaltender. As the league’s media guide notes, “The combination of the confined playing area and the physical play leads many fans to describe indoor lacrosse as like hockey, on foot, with more scoring.” Games are played in four quarters of 15 minutes each with a 30-second shot clock. Fans can expect a high-energy game with a league average of 23 combined goals per game.
“What we really like about the NLL, while it’s certainly lacrosse, the sport is played indoors on a hockey rink and has many of the same elements that hockey has,” Bibb says. “It’s high scoring and action packed.”
Each team plays an 18-game regular season with a similar structure to the NFL with all games played on weekends. NLL matchups are streamed on Turner Broadcasting’s B/R Live digital platform, and teams also negotiate local television deals.
In operation for 33 years, the NLL is the top level of indoor lacrosse. Fort Worth becomes the league’s 14th team, which also includes several franchises in the Northeast as well as Georgia, Colorado, and California and four teams in Canada. Some teams in the league average more than 10,000 fans per game.
The sport dates to the 17th century and was invented by Native Americans in the St. Lawrence Valley by the Algonquian tribe. Other tribes in the eastern half of North America and the western Great Lakes also began playing what was then referred to as “stick ball.” European settlers also took up the game, and lacrosse’s popularity in Canada grew by the 1800s. Fort Worth sports fans will soon have the chance to see plenty of high-level stick work firsthand.
“It is a Native American and native Canadian sport with a tremendous history,” says Bibb, who lives in Fort Worth. “We hope to rally the community around the fact that we are a Fort Worth professional sports team, and we’re playing in a world-class, brand-new venue.”
CHALLENGES AHEAD BUT READY TO TAKE THE FIELD
The new team will certainly have some positive momentum when it comes to that venue. Dickies Arena is a cutting-edge facility that opened in 2019 and seats 14,000 fans. The facility hosts numerous concerts, sporting events, and the Fort Worth Stock Show rodeo. But can Fort Worth’s team find space in a packed metroplex sports landscape that includes the NFL, NBA, NHL, NCAA, and several minor league teams? Bibb notes that the Dallas-Fort Worth area has become a lacrosse hotbed.
“North Texas is one of the fastest-growing youth lacrosse markets in the country,” Bibb says. “For years it was more of a regional sport primarily played in the Northeast, but over the last decade or so, it has really begun to spread across the country.”
A launch event is in the works for November to get the word out even more and announce the team name, logo, colors, and general manager. The team also plans on working with local lacrosse groups to build a grassroots group of fans. Local leaders in the sport have already embraced the team.
“We view this as a real milestone for lacrosse in this area, and it really provides an opportunity to help grow the sport,” Fort Worth Youth Lacrosse Association vice president Meredith Dorris says. “Our young players will have an elite team from which to watch and learn right here in our own backyard. Having indoor lacrosse in Fort Worth will really showcase this amazing sport.”
Beyond traditional lacrosse players and fans, Bibb says the game also appeals to those who aren’t well-versed in the game, and 70% of the NLL supporters don’t identify as traditional lacrosse fans. He hopes fans will appreciate the competitiveness and professionalism on the field — as well as an occasional big hit.
“This is not a minor league,” Bibb says. “These guys aren’t trying to get to a better higher level of play. This is the best indoor lacrosse in the world, and there’s nothing else close to it. And it will now be happening at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth.”
For more information on the team including upcoming ticket sales, visit fortworthnll.com.