Lacrosse stick materials: what the rules allow, and how sticks changed.

Materials by rule book

Each rule book sets its own list, and men's and women's lists are not the same. None of these rules says a particular product is legal: officials apply the rule in force for the game being played. World Lacrosse also lists a men's field version 1.1 (January 2026) and a women's field version 1.1 (March 2025); neither was read, so the field rows below are from version 1.0.

Pockets and nets

• Men's field (World Lacrosse 2025-2027, Rule 15.9): gut, rawhide, clock cord, linen or synthetic material, roughly triangular. Rule 15.6 lets a wall made of gut be any height, while wooden or plastic walls are limited to 2 in (5.08 cm).
• Women's field (World Lacrosse 2025-2026, Appendix H, part C): leather or synthetic thongs, nylon cord, mesh and pre-sewn pockets, each with limits; pocket nylon is nominally no more than 0.3 cm across, a figure the book calls a manufacturer's specification that officials do not measure in routine inspection.

Butt ends

Men's field Rule 15.4 requires a hollow butt end, and men's sixes Rule 2.2.1M the butt end, to be covered with plastic, rubber or tape, and both prohibit metal caps. Women's field Appendix H, B.1.c accepts an end cap, tape, a smooth sanded end if wood, or solid composite. Box Rule 2.4.2 requires a plastic or rubber plug or adequate tape.

Wood in box lacrosse: two rules

World Lacrosse box Rule 2.4.1 (2026-2028) allows only hollow synthetic or metal type sticks. Lacrosse Canada's memo of 28 January 2026 permits wooden sticks for players and goalies in the 2026 Canadian box season, unless a technical package or tournament contract says otherwise. The two cover different competitions: World Lacrosse events, and Lacrosse Canada's 2026 season. More on box sticks.

How the modern stick developed

The history below comes from Wikipedia, a secondary source, and has not been checked against a patent office, maker or museum record by this site.

• Wikipedia says the first plastic lacrosse head was patented by STX on 21 April 1970 (US Patent 3,507,495): a symmetrical head mounted on a wooden shaft.
• Wikipedia says STX received a patent for pocket mesh on 2 July 1974, and that by the 1980s mesh had largely replaced traditional stringing.
• Wikipedia says hollow aluminum shafts appeared in the early 1980s, lighter than wood.
• Wikipedia describes modern men's shafts as hollow, usually octagonal, and made of aluminum, titanium, scandium or alloys, with some still wood, plastic or fiberglass, and women's shafts as wood, metal alloy or composite.
• Wikipedia says hand-made wooden sticks, usually hickory with a steam-bent head, are still commonly used by box goaltenders, by senior and masters players and by women's field players, while plastic sticks are the main choice for most players.
• Wikipedia says nylon mesh was not permitted in women's sticks until 2018. No rule book date was found to confirm this, so it is unconfirmed.

The game's Indigenous origins and the history of stick-making belong to the history section of this site, not to this equipment reference.

Makers' claims

Makers describe their materials in their own terms, and those descriptions are claims, not tested findings. One example from the research: Warrior says its Alchemy STZ alloy attack shaft is made from scandium, titanium and zinc and that its die shape gives the best strength-to-weight ratio. Warrior gives no weight or alloy percentages, and no independent test of the claim was found. This site does not compare or rank materials or products.

When a material fell short

A US Consumer Product Safety Commission recall of 16 June 1997 covered older STX Titanium Plus handles, as many as 9,000, which might have been too thin to withstand severe blows. The recall and the others on record are on recalls and decertification.