that... could have been better
This hockey stuff is more trouble than it's worth.
I went to Kingston yesterday to wish my sister a happy birthday and stuff. Before that, we went to see her final game of the regular season. My parents were pretty anxious since she hadn't been scoring too many goals lately and her place in the standings was being challenged.
I guess the York Yeowomen (one of the stupidest names I ever heard; thank the gods that the practice of giving women's teams cutesy variants on the "official" school team name is coming to an end) were aware of her standing as well. From the start of the game they always had one or two players on top of her. She couldn't move. (Fortunately, with the defense distracted by my sister, they lost a couple of early goals by other players. There's some lesson in there about large numbers of eggs apportioned into scarce baskets). Obviously she was getting a teensy bit frustrated. It didn't help that the Yeowomen were taking advantage of the fact that the referees weren't calling anything for most of the first period.
As an aside, anybody who says that women's hockey is more of a "skills game" and isn't nearly as violent as the mens' obviously hasn't watched a women's hockey game. Just because they (sometimes) call penalties for "body contact" doesn't mean that there isn't body contact. Those girls are pretty brutal.
Near the end of the first period, a fight nearly broke out in front of the Yeowomen's net. Harsh words were exchanged and my sister felt moved to shove one of the opposing players from behind after the whistle. That got her her first penalty.
She got another penalty later, 'though I didn't see why. Queen's was scoring well, even though she wasn't. York had only scored two goals—both while she was in the penalty box. Even though it wasn't helping much, the Yeowomen kept up the dirty pool. My parents were getting tense and frustrated. They know my sister's a bit volatile and that she fancies herself something of an enforcer. Towards the end of the third period, she was sent on again and my mother said something like "He should really keep her on the bench. She's getting out of control."
The whistle was blown and a penalty was called on York. Things were a bit confused then. My sister yelled out to another player, I found out later, "Why don't you go back to York and learn to read!" I can only assume that this comment was in reference to the team's name, as it's a rather silly thing to say otherwise, hockey and literacy being largely unrelated. The game stopped. My sister was arguing with the ref as she was being escorted off the ice. The coaches were arguing. It turns out that the referee interpreted my sister's weak taunt to be a racial slur. The player in question was native, apparently, although how anyone (besides the referee, obviously) would have noticed that eludes me. She was given a gross misconduct penalty and sent out of the game.
Queens won the game 6-2. I'd pretty much lost interest, though.
She was crying when she got in the car. Calling her a racist is tantamount to punching her in the stomach. I was a bit relieved at the injustice of it all. It meant that my mother was trying her hardest to make her feel better, rather than yelling at her for blowing her chance at making MVP or the All Star team. I kept my mouth shut and did what I could to look sympathetic.