Penalty (PEN)

What counts as a penalty

A penalty in boys lacrosse is a foul that puts a player in the penalty box for a set time and leaves his team a man down. Personal fouls, such as a slash, an illegal body check, or unnecessary roughness, carry longer times. Technical fouls, such as offsides, holding, or interference, carry shorter ones, or a change of possession when the fouling team did not have the ball. The penalty is charged to the player who committed it and served by him.

Penalties cost twice. The team plays man-down for the length of the penalty, and the player's time adds up across the season into a number coaches watch for discipline.

How SquadProfile records it

Tap the player, then tap Penalty, then pick the type and the time. The app keeps a count of penalties and the total time served for each player and the team. Then start the man-down situation so the goals and shots during it are tagged, and end it when the penalty expires or is released.

Common mistakes

• Recording the penalty and forgetting to start man-down. The penalty count is right, but the man-down stats are missing.
• Recording a technical foul that only changed possession as a timed penalty. If nobody went to the box, there is no time to serve.
• Charging a team foul to the wrong player. Record it on the player who served it.

Where it shows up

Penalties do not have a column on the public leaderboards or box scores. They appear in the app, in each player's game and season stats as a count and total time, and in the team's totals.

Related stats

• Man-down: what your team plays while the penalty runs.
• Extra man: what the other team gets.
• Foul: the girls lacrosse infraction.