Leading off today: Budget cutting will likely cost Lansing High its junior-varsity teams in football and girls soccer next fall. The Lansing school board voted last week to propose a budget that is $1.3 million less than the one originally proposed, and it will go to the voters on May 20.

   "It was a situation where we had some programs where we had low participation," AD Ed Redmond told The Ithaca Journal. "On JV football last year we had 18 kids; JV girls soccer had 12. Programs we sort of looked at and knew we had to make some cuts."    Other cuts included away games for cheerleaders and the JV basketball cheerleading program.

   Track and field tidbits: When Aquinas junior Brianna Cromartie clocked a :55.23 in the 400 meters at the Arcadia Invitational in California last weekend, she broke a 23-year-old Section 5 record (:55.34).

   Newsday says East Meadow's 99½-83½ win over Oceanside on Tuesday was the first by the school's boys in a quadrangular in 15 years.

   Two strides forward, one step back? A report released by the University of Minnesota's Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport shows that girls are playing sports in record numbers, but their physical activity outside of organized sports is declining, especially as they move from childhood into adolescence.

   "The research within the report confirms that many good things are happening when it comes to girls and physical activity," said Nicole LaVoi, associate director of the Tucker Center and a report author.

   The report outlines the benefits girls reap from activity but also asserts that barriers, stereotypes and gender inequities limit girls. "Poverty substantially limits many girls' access to, and participation in, physical activity and sport, especially for girls of color who are overrepresented in lower socioeconomic groups," LaVoi said. "So while some girls are physically active, many girls fail to meet minimal standards of physical activity needed to accrue developmental and health benefits, or worse, they are completely sedentary. There remains a great deal of work left to be done."

   The report found girls' participation rates in all types of physical activities consistently lag behind boys, stereotypes of femininity and masculinity still influence the extent to which girls participate and female athletes continue to be trivialized through the popular media's widespread sexualization of women.

   Toughest job in sports? Middletown's Varsity845.com did a three-minute video piece on lacrosse goalies, calling their job perhaps the toughest in high school sports. You can check it out here.

   Etcetera: The New York State Public High School Athletic Association announced that Todd Nelson will join the organization as an assistant director in July as the replacement for Lloyd Mott, who is retiring. Nelson is the director of health, physical education and athletics at Herkimer. . . . The Allen Park Cabrini (Mich.) softball team's state-record winning streak ended at 80 games on Tuesday with a 2-0 loss to Pontiac Notre Dame Prep. The Monarchs went 35-0 a year ago with just one run allowed.

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