Elizabeth Lambert might be a nice person. She might genuinely feel bad about what she did in a soccer game that now lives online for all the world to see. Again and again. (ESPN has more of the video, and analysis, here).
But thanks to letting her emotions “get the best” of her, she’s now forever the “angry soccer player” from the University of New Mexico. With the evidence prominently on display on YouTube for who knows how long.
You want her coaching your daughter on a youth soccer team in 10 years or so?
Aside from the obvious idiocy of her actions – calling it “poor sportsmanship” doesn’t seem to cut it – Lambert’s 15 minutes of fame provides yet another study in how a university’s media relations/communications team has to put together an apology for an athlete who decided to play dirty.
While New Mexico’s damage police at least used the “uncalled for” phrase in the statement below – No, I don’t think Lambert wrote this – I don’t think it goes far enough:
“I am deeply and wholeheartedly regretful for my actions. My actions were uncalled for. I let my emotions get the best of me in a heated situation. I take full responsibility for my actions and accept any punishment felt necessary from the coaching staff and UNM administration. This is in no way indicative of my character or the soccer player that I am. I am sorry to my coaches and teammates for any and all damages I have brought upon them. I am especially sorry to BYU and the BYU women’s soccer players that were personally affected by my actions. I have the utmost respect for the BYU women’s soccer program and its players.”
A “heated situation”?
It was a soccer game.
I also like how Mario Trujillo puts it on the Daily Lobo, that “She let her emotions get the best of her on a second, third and fourth occasion before she was finished.”
I think this line from Lambert’s statement is a bunch of crap too: “… accept any punishment felt necessary…”
Liz, you don’t think something, anything… is necessary?
For the moment Lambert is suspended, but still on the New Mexico team. At least New Mexico’s VP for Athletics, Paul Krebs, used stronger language in his statement to the media:
“Liz’s conduct on the field against BYU was completely inappropriate… …There is no way to defend her actions.”
Exactly, so do something about it.
I know there are aggressive women’s soccer players across the country. But I highly doubt Lambert’s ponytail pull and punch to the nose is common practice on the playing field. Play the game. It’s not football. That crap would get her kicked out in basketball in a heartbeat.
What’s most surprising in this entire episode is that the BYU players didn’t fight back. Kudos to them for not taking the bait. And to those who say the BYU players may have engaged in pulling of shorts and tripping too… the answer is to snap a neck and smack someone on the nose?
The lack of fists used by the BYU players in retaliation is the real lesson for soccer players like my daughter, who watched the Lambert clip with me and just said, “Why did she do that?”
It was a “heated situation,” honey.
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