Dirty New Mexico soccer

Being pulled down by your ponytail can startle you and hurt your neck if you're not expecting it, but it wouldn't necessarily cause you to lay on the ground in pain unless you landed wrong. I have really thick hair, and yanking on my ponytail hurts my scalp substantially less than grabbing a smaller section of hair and try to work a knot out.

That said, the girl who was yanked could have a preexisting back or neck injury that would have been really exacerbated by being pulled down like that, so I wouldn't want to speak to whether she was trying to draw a call (not that she didn't deserve one in the first place). It looked like she landed on her shoulder rather than the back of her head, so there could be a shoulder injury component too.

It's really, really illegal though and deserving of a red even if you think she was "provoked" by the short tug. I've had a lot worse. Girls are really subtly mean to each other in games like this - fingernails, elbows, "accidentally" landing on someone's foot with your cleats. The trick is to keep it subtle enough that it could be passed off as an accident or at least an attempt at a soccer play.

I would have probably gotten up and done something equally stupid in retaliation, but that's the hockey player in me coming out.

 

I would guess she's done at New Mexico. I don't know if they rescind her scholarship or find some way to allow her to finish school ... but my gut tells me her soccer days are done there.

Deservedly so.

 

It's true. Women's soccer players don't flop, and they don't roll around on the ground begging for a foul call. They rarely try for Oscars, which is the exact opposite of the sometimes-embarrassing men's game.

As bad as she was, the officials completely lost control of that game. How did they see none of that? It seems like the TV producers of this game caught on pretty fast and basically said "Jimmy, don't take your camera off No. 15. Period."

Ugly, ugly stuff all the way around. She should never play again because she put a black eye on a collegiate sport that doesn't get that much publicity to begin with. Of course, if she would've gotten a red card when she first deserved one, she never would've had the chance to melt down and commit 3-4 more that also went uncalled.

 

She can play on Songbird's team...

 

Simply not true

 

Yes it is.

 

Yeah, I don't know where "women don't flop" comes from, because where I've seen it played, they dive as much as the guys. Maybe it's a product of Italy not having a World Cup-caliber women's team.

Which has no bearing whatsoever on this topic, because clearly that's not a flop job, but the fairer sex aren't always above doing their Eduardo impersonations.

 

It's a generalization that isn't true. You can say they don't do it as much or often as men, and I'd buy it but I've seen it happen first hand (yes, I've covered women's soccer) enough to know that blanket statement is false.

 

Fixed

 

The only thing I knew about U. of New Mexico soccer prior to this was that in 2002 or '03, twin sisters were kicked off the team because they missed too many team activities promoting their movie, The Real Cancun. The fact that they took part in a wet t-shirt contest in the movie had no bearing on the decision to dismiss them from the team, I'm sure.

 

She's from Lancaster, Calif.

http://www.golobos.com/sports/w-soccer/spec-rel/021207aaa.html

And I wouldn't kick her out of bed from getting rough.

 

That was a pretty weak elbow, and certainly not one to justify the punch that followed, and everything else.
Elizabeth Lambert is a thug. Period.