The Wolves: A Play

The Wolves, a play by Sarah DeLappe, was developed at Playwrights Horizons in 2015 and debuted Off-Broadway in 2016. The titular Wolves are a suburban girls’ indoor soccer team, comprising nine girls, aged 16 to 17 years old, who are unnamed and identified only by their jersey numbers. The play is presented in one act with no intermission, each of the six scenes set on a consecutive Saturday as the girls warm up and prepare for their weekly games. In her preface to the Off-Broadway edition of The Wolves (2018), DeLappe likens their preparations to warriors readying for battle. They have (mostly) been playing together for over a decade, and they are competitive and undefeated with little to no assistance from their ineffectual male coach. The play, DeLappe’s first, was immediately successful. In 2015, it received the American Playwriting Foundation’s first Relentless Award. The play was a 2015-16 finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. In 2017, the play returned to Off-Broadway with a limited engagement at Lincoln Center’s Mitzie Newhouse Theater, for which it won an Obie Award in 2017 for Ensemble work. The Wolves was also a finalist for the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, “For a timely play about a girls’ high school soccer team that illuminates with the unmistakable ping of reality the way young selves are formed when innate character clashes with external challenges” (“Finalist: The Wolves, by Sarah DeLappe.” The Pulitzer Prizes). Widely lauded as a play that captures an authentic representation of the voices of teenaged girls, The Wolves has also been included in American Theatre’s top 10 list of the most-produced plays from 2018 to 2020.

This guide uses the edition of The Wolves published by Overlook Press in 2018.

Content Warning: The source text includes references to or depictions of death by suicide, genocide, abortion, racism, sexism, sexual assault, an ableist slur, death, anti-gay attitudes, eating conditions, the forced incarceration and dehumanization of migrants, and possible addiction to alcohol.

Plot Summary

The play takes place on the Astroturf indoor soccer field on which the Wolves, an undefeated nine-player girls’ soccer team, aged 16 to 17, prepare for their weekly Saturday games. They are identified only by their jersey numbers. As they stretch, simultaneous conversations occur about the Cambodian genocide and the merits of tampons over pads for the less experienced #2, who is on her period. A new teammate who has so far only remained on the bench, #46, is ignored when she tries to fit in. #7, who is edgy and rebellious, complains to #14, described as #7’s sidekick, for hitting her currently sensitive breast. #46’s joke about pregnancy backfires with awkwardness because, as #00, the goalie, explains, #7 recently had an abortion. In the second scene, the following week, the team is still undefeated. #2 is selling scarves to benefit migrant children incarcerated at the border, and #7 expresses ardent support for their rights. This brings them to ask about #14’s experience as an immigrant (she is half Armenian and not Mexican as they assume).

#46 arrives late, and #25, the captain, sends her to change. When she returns, #46 hears the girls gossiping about her, saying how she is homeschooled, smells, and lives in a yogurt (a yurt). Everyone is excited when #14’s mom brings them orange slices. They decide to take a silly picture with them, inviting #46 to join, although #46 gets upset that she doesn’t get what they’re doing. #25 tells her to just get in the photo.

The following Saturday falls on a three-day weekend coinciding with #7’s birthday. #7 made plans to go to her dad’s ski chalet with her boyfriend—who is home from college—#14, and an attractive college guy to pair with #14. Next weekend is the showcase tournament for college scouts, but one scout is a week early for the star player on the other team. #7 is angry when #25 decides to start #46 as striker, which is usually #7’s position. In the next scene, Week Four, the Wolves lost their first game, and #7 is out of commission indefinitely, having torn her ACL. She and #14 are also angry at each other because, over the weekend, #7 left #14 alone with her boyfriend’s friend and #7 is mad #14 didn’t engage in sexual activity with him.

The other girls are impressed with #46, seeing her play for the first time. #46 has never played on a real team before, but when traveling with her mother, she found soccer was a way to make friends without knowing the language. The next scene, called “Time Out,” is #00 alone. She goes from lying face down on the Astroturf to primally screaming her frustrations.

In the final scene, Week Six, the players arrive one by one, unsure whether they will be playing or forfeiting (like the previous week). They need six players to show up to have a full roster. Over the course of the scene, the conversation among the girls reveals one of their teammates died. Uncomfortable, they discuss their limited experience with death. #7, still on crutches, is the last to show up, and it becomes clear #14 died being hit by a car while on a pre-dawn run. They reveal #7’s name, calling her Alex. With all the girls present, they start their warm-ups, becoming more cheerful in the process.

Then, a grief-stricken Soccer Mom enters. She is #14’s mom, although she calls her daughter Megan, and she gives a rambling speech encouraging the girls to do their best in the game today. Then, distractedly, the Soccer Mom announces she forgot something in her car and rushes off. When she returns, she watches as the team chants, “We are the Wolves” (174-75), softly at first and then growing to a loud yell. She brought the team a bag of orange slices.