Playing basketball isn't a sport for women.That's what Jewell Chapman's high school headmaster told her in 1961 when he forbade the girls to play basketball."We were very sad,"said Chapman,a player for her high school team of Des Moines. Nearly 50 years later,Chapman is back on the basketball playground.She is 62 years old and plays for the Hot Pink Grannies,joining about 10 other women on a team whose uniforms are black trousers and hot pink socks.They play in the Iowa Granny Basketball League. It is one of the twelve of basketball leagues for women over 50 that have spread up across the country.For some, it's an opportunity to exercise and socialize;for others,it's a once-refused chance to compete."You see more and more senior women's teams taking part in state and national competitions,"said Michael Rogers,a professor in sports studies at Wichita State University."In the future it will be a common thing to have leagues like this." Yearly researches by the National Sporting Goods Association show the number of women of 55 and older who play basketball at least 50 times a year has grown from 16,000 in 1995 to nearly 131,000 ten years later. The women on the Hot Pink Grannies are good-natured but they are competitive when game time comes."I think I'm tough,"says Hot Pink Granny Colleen Pulliam, 69, showing her biceps in a game against the Strutters, known for their bright yellow socks. Granny Basketball Leagues and similar groups are scattered through much of the country, including California,Connecticut, Louisiana,New Mexico,North Carolina,Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. When game time comes,the women on the Hot Pink Grannies are_.
good-natured active friendly happy