Are You Ready for Some ... Women?

At halftime, things looked grim for the Kansas City Tribe.

The Tribe — the latest addition to the collective of women's football in Kansas City — traveled to Texas to play its first-ever game April 12 against the Dallas Diamonds. On that cool Saturday evening, the powerhouse Diamonds unleashed their star player, Jessica Springer. The linebacker and running back, who wore No. 46, demolished everything in her path. At the end of the second quarter, Dallas was up 35-0.

In the locker room, though, the Tribe women were still determined. A volley of voices echoed off the cinderblock walls of the high school stadium's locker room.

"I know you guys are better than this. I've seen it weekly," one of the players yelled.

"We're not going to leave here with a goose egg," said another. "I don't give a fuck about the score. We can't leave here with a goose egg."

The coaches waited outside so that the team could vent. The players were tired, frustrated and pissed. With their helmets off, the women spread out in the locker room. They took swigs of water and ate bananas. Toward one corner of the room, Mindy White sat on the floor. A red skullcap covered the top of her head, and two braids framed her flushed face. She went off on No. 46.

"She's like a fucking pingpong. A fucking freight train. You have to get her early before she gains speed. Give her two steps, and boom!" White punctuated her sentiment by making a chugging train sound and propelling one arm in a forward motion.

Head coach Ed Williams, followed by his staff, entered the room. Everyone stopped talking, and for a few seconds the only sound was the loud, persistent buzz of the fluorescent lights.

In a quiet voice, Williams said he wasn't worried about the score. It could be 10-0 or 7-0. But each unit wasn't doing what it needed to do. He chastised the team for not heeding the coaches' instructions.

"Unfortunately, you don't listen. You don't take direction that works," he said, his voice steadily growing louder. Soon it was a roar of displeasure resonating in the bare locker room and within the players. "Bottom line: It's all about character and you. Who you represent, who you want to be seen as.

"Let's decide. The score could be 80 to nothing, and we can go home. Or the score can be 36 to 35. You have to make that choice. So when you walk out of that locker room, you have to say, 'You got to nut up.'"

"Nut up, bitches! Let's go!" a player yelled. They huddled the middle of the room and shouted, "Tribe!" before storming out of the locker room.

"Now we're going to see what type of team we got," assistant coach Torris Babbs said as he walked onto the field behind the team. "Will they lie down or keep fighting?"

The first half of the game was an inauspicious beginning for the eight-month-old team. In Kansas City, the sport of women's football dates back to 2003. It started with a now-defunct team called the Kansas City Krunch and another team called the Storm. The Tribe, a semi-professional team, is the third group to take the field. The intertwined history of these three teams has been, for the most part, rocky and divisive. Making it through the season without losing too much money is one challenge for the Tribe. Another is earning some recognition in a town that's all about the established, big-name men's teams.

But the immediate challenge for the Tribe? Putting some points up in its first game.

A day earlier, a charter bus sat in a Hen House parking lot. The lumbering machine made a diagonal slash against the white grid pattern on the blacktop. As the wind whipped around outside, Tribe players toted pillows and blankets onboard.

The bus speakers blared "California Dreamin'" and other songs from the '60s Vibrations satellite station. A tough-looking player with short, spiky hair and a hefty build carried a football-shaped pillow. Players of varying body types — ranging from slender to beefy, short to statuesque — filtered onto the bus. Two latecomers straggled on, sporting form-fitting track jackets and tight jeans. Designer-looking sunglasses and mussed ponytails completed their look. One carried a white Arden B. shopping bag.

Then White entered the bus. The bubbly 30-year-old is the general manager and part-owner of the team as well as a veteran player who defected from the Storm. She opened a large cardboard box in a front-row seat. In it were the white jerseys with red trim and navy-blue numbers that had arrived that morning. If they hadn't shown up, the ever-efficient White had a backup plan. It involved diverting the bus to Melvern, Kansas, her hometown, where she would borrow jerseys from her high school.

She stood at the front of the bus and started handing them out. Her teammates were delighted. "Oh, they're so pretty!" a few of them cried.

"I feel like Santa Claus," White said.

"Don't wash it with red," someone instructed.

"Wash it in cold," advised Williams, who was settling into the other set of front-row seats.