One by one, gloomy face after gloomy face, Pima Collegeβs menβs soccer players walked into the campusβ Sentinel Peak building Wednesday afternoon. They were followed by their parents, their coaches, by PCCβs chancellor, athletic director, an attorney and anyone else wishing to hear the bad news.
Do you want to see a grown man cry? Pima College menβs soccer coach Dave Cosgrove cried.
βThese kids did nothing wrong,β he said, halting, searching for words. βThey did exactly what they were coached to do.β
At 1 p.m., Wednesday, the Aztecs, winners of a third straight ACCAC tournament championship, planned to arrive at the Denver airport and board a bus to Laramie, Wyoming, where they would play Trinidad State JC in Fridayβs West District semifinals.
Instead, their season is over.
It was like getting sucker-punched and then getting thrown in jail.
βIt was a shock to me,β said PCC athletic director Edgar Soto. βI kept saying, βthis canβt be true.βββ
He, too, shed some tears.
Late Saturday night at Kino North Stadium, the Aztecs beat Phoenix College 3-1 to win a third consecutive ACCAC soccer title. GoBears SportsNet, which provides live streaming of most Phoenix College sports events, videotaped the game.
Ordinarily, that would be good. The camera doesnβt lie.
The game tape ended after 2 hours 2 minutes 58 seconds. It was all good. The Aztecs would go home believing that an 18-3-1 record and a No. 9 national ranking could lead to the NJCAA national championship.
But at 2:03.08 on the tape β 12 seconds after the game ended β a Phoenix Bear punched Pimaβs A.J. Valenzuela in the face. No warning. Nothing but knuckles.
At 2:03:25, a policeman can be seen running onto the field.
At 2:04.21, another Phoenix player punched another Pima Aztec. And then a third Aztec was punched.
A group of Pima players ran to the aid of their teammates and kept the one-sided fight from escalating. But no one in an orange Pima uniform can be seen throwing a punch or making a bad situation worse.
At 2:05.22, three policemen stood at midfield. Peace was restored.
At 2:07.19, the Aztecs began a celebration, dumping ice-water over one anotherβs heads.
Nobody got arrested. Nobody went to the hospital, but it only took 2 minutes and 14 seconds for Pimaβs season to come crashing down.
When Soto arrived to work Tuesday morning, he opened an email from Mary Ellen Leicht, retiring executive director of the NJCAA. In a wordy, two-page tome, Leicht declared all of the Aztecs and their coaches suspended for two games, effective now.
Hereβs how her message ended:
βThere is no appeal of a ruling made by the NJCAA National Office in the case of a non-collegial incident.β
In this case, βnon-collegial incidentβ means fight.
Except Pima didnβt provoke the fight, nor did it retaliate.
The total absence of due process became a side issue, rendered moot by a lack of notice and time. Itβs too late for the Aztecs to get to Wyoming. Early Tuesday morning, the NJCAA alerted third-place Yavapai College that it would replace the Aztecs in the national playoffs.
Game on: The Roughriders are already in Laramie preparing for Fridayβs game.
Game over: The Aztecs stayed home.
On Tuesday, Phoenix College athletic director Samantha Ezell sent Soto an email apologizing for the melee and recognizing that the Bears were at fault.
That apology and $5 wonβt buy the Aztecs a cup of nothing.
The NJCAA, citing rule 10-4.8, said that anyone leaving the bench area during a fight will be suspended. Itβs not unlike the NBA rule in which former Phoenix Suns star Amare Stoudemire was suspended from a 2007 playoff game in which Steve Nash was hip-checked into the scorerβs table.
Although Stoudemire didnβt move more than 4 or 5 feet, the NBA ruled he left the βimmediate vicinity of the bench,β and chose to enforce the letter of the rule instead of the spirit of the game.
Similarly, the NJCAA chose to be heavy-handed.
βWhen I got the NJCAAβs email, I thought it would say βthank you for your restraint,βββ Soto said. βOur players moved toward a spot where their teammates were getting punched, and thatβs considered an act of aggression. Weβre not angels, but we didnβt throw punches.β
Leicht left her NJCAA office by 3 Wednesday afternoon and wasnβt available for a phone interview, although she canβt be faulted for implementing more bite into the organizationβs sportsmanship rules.
In an October 2015 football game in Scooba, Mississippi, defending national champion East Mississippi Community College engaged in a halftime brawl with Mississippi Delta College. The fight, available on YouTube, is frightening in its scope.
It became so notorious that it triggered a Netflix movie, βLast Chance U.β It also launched more forceful NJCAA penalties for fighting in all sports. Unfortunately, Pima Collegeβs championship soccer team has become Exhibit A of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
βThis is a no-tolerance policy,β said PCC chancellor Lee Lambert. βBut we disagree with Leightβs interpretation of it.β
Pimaβs soccer players did nothing wrong but will be punished for Phoenix Collegeβs vicious behavior. As they listened to their chancellor explain the decision Wednesday, many of them stared at the ground, shaking their heads.
Helpless.
βThe lesson we will try to teach,β said Soto, βis that lifeβs not always fair.β
