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The Teen Wolf TV show is loosely based on the film of same name where basketball was the essential part of the plot but in the TV show they changed it to lacrosse.
But why? Games like basketball and football have better global approach. Lacrosse doesn't seem like a recognizable game outside of America. So why did they pick lacrosse?
The show's writer and producer Jeff Davis explains:
Davis said, “A lot of the conflict of the first season is Scott having to control and hide his abilities now that he’s a werewolf. One of the reasons we actually chose lacrosse as the sport is that he gets to wear a helmet and it’s a much more violent sport than basketball. So we get to hide his features under a mask, which can help, but he still has to struggle to control his powers because it’s possible for him as a werewolf to get so worked up on the field that he could almost kill someone.”
He provides a similar answer in this interview:
One of the reasons we chose lacrosse as the sport is he gets to wear a helmet — and it’s a much more violent sport than basketball — although I’ve seen some pretty impressive fights in basketball. So we get to hide his features under a mask and he gets to race across the screen at night. So we were able to take some liberties with that with the sport — hiding him under a helmet.
In another interview he points to multiple reasons:
ASSIGNMENT X: Lacrosse – really? I don’t know of any California high school team that has lacrosse.
DAVIS: I grew up in Connecticut, and lacrosse was a very big sport at our prep school. We decided a lot of other TV shows and movies have done basketball and have done them probably better than I could do. And I remember kids walking around high school with lacrosse sticks sticking out of their backpacks and looking like gladiators. They always looked pretty cool. First of all, lacrosse has never been seen, and second of all, it’s a pretty violent sport. It was developed by native Americans as a way to resolve conflicts. They would play it for weeks with hundreds of players and it would get quite bloody. It has an interesting history and it adds a certain amount of violence and energy to the series.
