Mouthguards for Young Athletes: A Tinley Park Parent’s Guide to Fall Sports Season
The turf at Freedom Park fills up in August. A custom sports mouthguard is the cheapest piece of equipment on your list and the only one that protects something that does not grow back.
Two Short Visits
Scan, then fit and adjust
Scanned, Not Boiled
Digital impression, no putty
7 a.m. Start
Before school, before practice
Why August
The Equipment List Everybody Finishes Except One Line
Every Tinley Park parent knows the August routine. Cleats that fit this year, a helmet that has been recertified, shin guards, a water bottle with a name on it. The sports mouthguard is usually the last line on the list and the one that gets handled with a five dollar package from the checkout aisle on the way to the first practice.
That is understandable, and it is also the one piece of the kit where the cheap version fails in a specific and predictable way. It does not fail by breaking. It fails by not being in your child’s mouth.
Freedom Park on Timber Drive is fifteen acres of exactly the sports this matters for. The synthetic turf field carries football and soccer, and there is a regulation baseball field and a softball field alongside it. Add the Tinley Park Athletic Club football, lacrosse, wrestling and cheer programs, the diamonds and soccer pitches over at the 53 acre Community Park, and the fall schedules at Andrew and Tinley Park High School, and there is a large number of local kids about to spend the next three months in close contact with elbows, sticks, shoulders and the ground.
Head to Head
Boil and Bite Against a Custom Fitted Guard
Both are technically mouthguards. They behave completely differently once a twelve year old is wearing one for a two hour practice in August heat.
If your child grinds their teeth at night as well, that is a different appliance with a different design. Ask about night guards at the same visit rather than trying to make one guard do both jobs.
Braces
If Your Child Is in Orthodontic Treatment, This Matters More
A knock to the mouth without braces is usually a bruised lip. The same knock with brackets on the teeth turns metal into the inside of the lip, and a hit that shifts the appliance can cost months of treatment progress that has already been paid for.
Guards for athletes in braces are built differently. They need clearance for the hardware and enough give that the guard still seats correctly as the teeth move through treatment, which is the entire point of the treatment. A boil and bite molded tightly around a set of brackets is actively working against the orthodontics. Tell us at the appointment that your child is in treatment and the guard gets made for it. The American Dental Association keeps a plain language overview of caring for teeth during orthodontic treatment if you want background before you come in.
One more piece of practical advice from the front desk: buy a case, write the name on it, and keep it in the bag rather than the pocket. The most common reason a custom guard needs remaking early is not wear. It is a washing machine.
Emergency
If a Tooth Gets Knocked Out on the Field
Print this part, or keep it on your phone. An adult tooth has its best chance of being saved when it goes back into the socket quickly, and the window is measured in minutes rather than days. What happens in the first few of them is mostly down to whoever gets to the sideline first.
Pick It Up by the Crown
Handle only the chewing surface. The root surface carries the cells that let the tooth reattach, and touching it damages them.
Rinse, Do Not Scrub
If it is dirty, rinse it briefly with milk or saline. No soap, no scrubbing, no drying it off with a towel.
Reseat It or Use Milk
If your child can cooperate, put it back in the socket and have them hold it gently in place. If not, transport it in milk.
Call Us on the Way
708-429-2111. Say a tooth has been knocked out and roughly when it happened. That is a same day call.
A baby tooth is handled differently and generally is not replanted, so if you are not certain which it was, bring it and let us look. Either way the visit is the same one: see our emergency dental care page for what to expect when you arrive.
Why Here
Scanned, Fitted and Followed Up in One Building
A mouthguard appointment is short, which makes it a good moment to also have someone look at how the adult teeth are coming in. That is easier when the people doing both are the same practice.
A Scan, Not a Putty Tray
The impression is taken with iTero digital scanning, which takes minutes and asks nothing of a gaggy nine year old.
Six Dentists on Staff
From pediatric visits through to the chipped tooth nobody planned for. Meet them on the doctors page.
Hours Built Around Practice
Open at 7 a.m. Tuesday through Thursday and until 7 p.m. Monday through Thursday, so the fitting does not cost a practice or a shift.
Getting Here
Minutes from Freedom Park and Community Park
We are on 80th Avenue between 175th and 179th, a short drive from the Timber Drive fields and from the diamonds at Community Park. The 7 a.m. slots go first in August, so book a week or two ahead if you want one before school starts.
The Office
On 80th Avenue Since 1974
McGonigle Dental has practiced from the same Tinley Park building since 1974, which means a fair number of the parents booking a mouthguard this month were themselves brought here for one. A good share of the schedule is patients of fifteen years or more, and that continuity is the practical reason the same office can hold a child’s records from the first cleaning through to the last set of wisdom teeth.
What Patients Say
Trusted Across the Southwest Suburbs
“Three kids, three sports, one office that knows all of them. That is worth a lot in August.”
— Read more on our patient reviews page
Common Questions
Tinley Park Parent Questions About Sports Mouthguards
The questions that come up at the front desk every August.
Is a custom mouthguard really better than one from the sporting goods store?
The difference is fit, and fit is what decides whether the guard is actually in the mouth during the play that matters. A boil and bite guard is molded at home over a kitchen pot, so it is thick where it does not need to be and loose where it does. Kids push them out with their tongue, chew through them, or leave them on the bench. A custom guard is made from a scan of your child’s own teeth, so it stays put without being held in place, and they can talk and breathe in it. The best guard is the one your child keeps in.
What age should a child start wearing a sports mouthguard?
As soon as they are in a sport with contact or a swinging implement, which for a lot of Tinley Park families means the first season of tackle football, lacrosse or hockey around age seven or eight. Younger children in baseball and soccer benefit too, since most youth dental injuries in those sports come from collisions and elbows rather than the ball. If your child still has a mix of baby and adult teeth, the guard will need remaking as the mouth changes, which is worth planning for rather than being surprised by.
Does my child need a mouthguard if they wear braces?
Yes, and it matters more, not less. Brackets turn an ordinary knock into a cut lip, and a hit that moves the appliance can undo months of orthodontic work. Guards for athletes in braces are made differently, with room for the hardware and enough flexibility that the guard still seats when the teeth move. Tell us at the appointment that your child is in treatment so the guard is built for it.
How long does it take to get a custom mouthguard made?
Plan on two short visits. The first is a digital scan of the teeth, which takes a few minutes and involves no putty tray. The guard comes back from the lab and is fitted and adjusted at the second visit. Getting the scan done in August rather than after the first game is the whole point of doing this now.
What do I do if my child’s tooth gets knocked out at a game?
Find the tooth and pick it up by the crown, the chewing part, never the root. If it is dirty, rinse it briefly in milk or saline, not by scrubbing it. If your child is old enough to cooperate, put the tooth back in the socket and have them hold it there. If not, transport it in milk. Then call us straight away. An adult tooth has its best chance of being saved when it is replanted within about an hour, so this is a same day call, not a Monday call.
Can we get an appointment around practice and work schedules?
Tuesday through Thursday the office opens at 7 a.m., and Monday through Thursday it stays open until 7 p.m. Families with a Freedom Park practice schedule generally take the first slot of the morning before school or the last one after work, which keeps the appointment from costing anyone a practice.
For general background on how mouth protectors work, the American Dental Association keeps a plain language mouthguards overview. Equipment requirements vary by sport and league, so check your own league’s rule sheet for what is mandatory this season.
Get It Scanned Before the First Whistle
17519 80th Ave., Tinley Park, IL · Serving Orland Park, Mokena, Frankfort, Homer Glen and Oak Forest