High school coach fired after he was caught on camera pulling player's ponytail
 

Wow.


https://cbs6albany.com/news/local/hi...ayers-ponytail


<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Northville High School fired girl&#39;s basketball coach Jim Zullo for yanking a player&#39;s ponytail after a loss. <br><br>How would you respond if this happened to your daughter?<a href="https://t.co/CYs4IZKiL8">pic.twitter.com/CYs4IZKiL8</a></p>&mdash; TaraBull (@TaraBull808) <a href="https://twitter.com/TaraBull808/status/1903496485939143156?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 22, 2025</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

Hi I'm her Dad, I need to talk to you in the parking lot

WTF??! Excuse me, MF!!

He could be looking at 20+ years in jail for attempted murder. He's lucky she survived that light tug of her hair.

I would definitely be meeting him at the George Brett statue

Yeah, it's not like he threw her to the ground or whatever. But most dads are probably going to react badly seeing that.

Dad needs to beat the **** out of him

Don’t mind the tire iron in my hand. It’ll all make sense soon enough.

He'll be dead from natural causes soon enough. Meet him after sodding

Tough situation for the team. You have to applaud her teammate for standing up to the coach, figure of absolute authority, and pulled his malice towards her. He could end her playing career for talking back, yet there she was. Epitome of a teammate right there and that coach can get ****ed. No doubt he’s done worse in the gym.

putting your hands on a player as a coach is a huge no no

That's what got Gene Hackman fired and banned from NCAA in Hoosiers.

Dude wouldn't survive 20 seconds at the George Brett Statue

he would find out what a few false teeth cost. Not a violent person but you do that to my grand and we will have a violent confrontation

You're the guy who posts about how incredibly Christian you are. You should be more about turning the other cheek than all Old Testament fire & brimstone stuff. Give the 81 year old geezer a break, it's not like he gave the girl a hell of a beating like the one I inflicted on TheGuardian at the George Brett last year.

I thought it was gonna be worse. Inappropriate for sure.

Good on 20 something for helping her out.

A 5 hernia repair surgery would feel like a prostate milking after I pulled my foot out of his ass at the GBS

Psych! I don’t pull out at the GBS, mfer!

Guess I'm gonna be in the minority here.

There's just nowhere near enough context here to know if I give a shit or not. I mean I've grabbed my kid by the shirt and yanked her off a bench before. I've also told any coach any of my daughters have had that they should absolutely do what's necessary to get their attention.

Is there a world where I'd be fine with a coach I trust/know grabbing my daughter by the ponytail? **** yes there is. If you're barking at the refs or the other team or just being a disrespectful or inattentive asshole - fine. Go get her, Coach.

And I get it - some people are just adamantly opposed to that. 'Never ever touch a player' - meh. Don't adhere to that school.

As a coach I won't do it because I know too many parents that do. But as a parent I have no problem with it at all.

This might be something I'd be okay with. Might also deserve a trip to the George Brett statue. I really just don't know.

These people got timeout in school

Bobby knight or Northville High School basketball coach????

In my day if your shirt wasn't tucked in. You walked around the outside of the school in just your jockeys -Skop Townhouse

If you yanked my ponytail I'd beat your ass that's a straight up bitch move.

He's pulling her hair because he's fairly certain there aren't going to be any repercussions. It's a bitch move. What leader needs to pull a young woman's hair, yanking her backward to get her attention or make a point?

She should've kicked his nuts up into his throat if it's a physical interaction friendly type of dynamic.

Guy lost his job, well deserved. He's old as **** so it's harder to say stomp out the senile old bastard but definitely a shiner/broken nose/throatpunch/nutshot is in order.

Consequences. Bring em back.

Breaking the face of an old man due to him applying the same immaturity as the average 2nd grader seems appropriate.

A larger amount of violence should surely point out how inappropriate a minimal amount of violence is.

I'd rather have my hair pulled. Than do wind sprints any day

What the ****? Her jersey was right there. This wasn't about "getting her". This was about inflicting pain. On a young girl that he knows can't retaliate. This guy has no place working with kids. If this is my daughter, I'm not gonna beat his ass, but I will have his ****ing job.

The old man's toast soldiers have gone dry

Man, Rainbarrel is really emptying the clip on this one.

I think we have to ask ourselves what tooge would have done?

Womble wouldn't take the bait & I had to use it somewhere

Maybe he seen she had a spider in her hair and was pulling it out for her.

He was doing her a great favor. She should be grateful and appreciative for him.

Need more context. Did the bitch have it coming or not?

Meanwhile she's begging guys to pull her hair 30 minutes after class ends but angry daddy has no idea his fallen angel is emotionally manipulating him while splitting two hogs like a gymnast-y.

You keep your ****ing hands off of my kids.

You reproduced?

Whenever I see TheTardian post, I curse the day you produced your own little mongoloid.

You're right. Context matters. But I think there is enough there to be like, nah. If there was any being mouthy or yelling at the refs, the proper move is to get them away from the court on the bench. I've been in a ****load of basketball games, and the way to get control of your bench is to get between the bench and the sideline.

I can’t think of one reason a girls basketball coach would have to pull a girls ponytail. Not one.

I'm pretty chill as a sports parent but if I witnessed that I would definitely be down there ASAP putting hands on that coach. Not acceptable.

what a ****wad.

I don't have kids, so maybe I'm completely out of touch. I wouldn't have really thought about this if it was my kid. Coaches grab players to get their attention, don't they?

What if billay yanked your ponytail while he was clapping your cheeks

I'm sure Andy Reid grabs guys by the dreadlocks daily /

The incident involves a highly accomplished coach and a highly accomplished player. The coach won a state championship in boys basketball in 1987 and was later voted to the hall of fame for coaches in New York. The player is the all-time leading scorer for the program. Today, Coach Zullo issued this statement (https://www.timesunion.com/news/arti...g-20236765.php). In an earlier report, "Zullo told NEWS10 ABC that Monroe directed an expletive toward Zullo after he instructed her to shake hands with the opposing team, leading to the incident." https://www.news10.com/sports/northv...t-with-player/

It's also potentially relevant that Monroe had fouled out just before the closing minutes of the game and it was a hard-fought game to decide the state championship. So, if she had in fact said an expletive to the coach, she may have been upset about having been fouled out.

Anyway, I graduated high school in the 1980s and played high school sports. When I played, you could expect far worse from a coach if you cussed at him, especially if in fact you did it in a context that had to do with showing good sportsmanship or some other high-stakes situation. I'm not saying it's excusable what the coach did, but I am saying I damn sure can understand how a coach from a different era would react in a situation like that.

In HS (what maybe 37 years ago?) if I'd ever cursed at one of my coaches, they probably would've slapped me in the mouth. And I'm reasonably sure that my dad would've slapped me in the mouth as soon as he found out what I'd done.



But we live in different times now and coddling people even when they disrespect their teachers/coaches/elders is the norm not the exception.

It's good that the teammate stepped in to defend, but I would bet that the coach was himself glad that she did, because good coaches want their players to defend one another. The coach didn't have a beef with the teammate. He had a beef with the player whose hair he tugged. Anyway, it's just a sad situation. I never played for a state championship, but I know how it is when you're a kid and realizing that you lost that one chance. For the coach, he probably long ago figured out how to handle disappointments in the postseason, but he considers it important for the players to develop character and show class in key moments. I'm sure he is upset with himself for how he reacted in that situation. It's just an all-around sad situation.

I'm glad you mentioned the parents' reaction, because that is something I was also thinking but failed to say. I couldn't imagine cussing at a coach when he told me to shake hands with the other team and if I ever were to cuss at a coach in that situation, I would expect parents and other adults who knew anything at all about sports to be angry at me.

I don't give a shit what era you are. You don't put your hands on an young girl.

In the video the girl was crying and not even looking at the coach. He snuck up behind her and grabbed and pulled her hair.

He isn't a stable person and should not be around kids.

Tough way to end what sounded like a storied career.

I played for one of the most notorious coaches around in high school. He had no problem dressing you down like a drill sergeant. He NEVER laid a hand on anyone. And this was in the 1980's. There's absolutely zero excuse for this. Even if she cursed at him, he's a grown adult that should be able to brush it off and not put his hands on a kid. **** him. He deserves everything he gets.

Male coach yanks young females players hair.

What world do you live in where you don't take a punch on principle for this?

Don't start none, won't be none, fafo, stupid games stupid prizes, pick your favorite.

He claimed its because she cussed at him lmao. Cuss back, you old bastard, but keep your ****in hands to yourself. She's the teams leading scorer as well.

If you're okay with anyone putting hands on your kid, you should gently **** yourself with a chainsaw.

Yeah it's a real shame a grown man can't pull a kids hair and slap them with impunity. I remember the meatheads that coached at my school. I would not be interested in what they thought constituted physical violence on my child. There are better, more effective methods of discipline that are far from "coddling".

For you to put your hands on someone else's child during a school event under those circumstances show a complete lack of impulse control or severe anger issues.

Both disqualify you from ever being a teacher or anything to do with kids.

What a loser. Maximum penalty.

Guilty

It was a little harder than I expected and he deserves to be let go. But can we stop with the overreactions of shouldn’t be around kids or is a terrible person that has no emotional control? He’s been a coach for what 40 years? Unless we start seeing a pattern of physical reactions like this then it’s reasonable to assume he had a bad reaction at a bad time that deserves punishment but don’t have to act like he’s some monster that has always abused kids and just got caught finally.

If you cussed around or at the high school coach, the coach would have your grandparents come and in front of the whole team and others. The grandparents would check the offender for worms, followed by an enema. Then the offender was only allowed to eat pumpkin seeds for a week. And you pussies are worried about a little hair tug. A hair tug, not a thumb up the ass, not a wooden spoon to the nuts smacking, a hair tug. drop some nuts CP.

If he had grabbed the jersey to turn her around and deliver an ass chewing it might have got a pass from some depending on exactly what caused it. The hair makes it a no go for me.

Wouldn't be surprised if age, or something else in his life, is the root cause. We had an aging coach in high school who everyone knew needed to step away. He was old school, but it was more so all the years of stress adding up. He eventually threw a chair in class that broke a window in front of a room full of non football players and it lead to him stepping away. He became a whole new man and an even better member of the community once he stepped away from the stress of living up to the legacy.

Were talking about a dude who returned to coaching after his wife was diagnosed with terminal cancer. What a great time to spend extra time away from home.

Stories have his wife urging him to take the job as part of his un retiring.

Now, how big of an asshole do you have to be that your terminally ill wife wants you out of the way so she can ****ing die in peace?

That's just the thing. The dude is a HOF coach. It's entirely likely that he's been like this all a long and people just looked the other way.

Agreed, he should be tazed and given a few solid shots will a billy club.

Like Bobby Knight. Nobody's above the consequences of such churlish behavior.

Maybe he has and maybe he hasn't, but if he acts this way at this point he certainly shouldn't be around kids. And he continues after her chewing her out along with the girl who defends her. Doesn't seem like the actions of someone who just got too hot in the moment and did something out of character.

I trust my mother. I trust my siblings. I trust my wife. But there is no world in which I would be "fine" with any of them jerking my daughter by the hair.

It's not making the kid tough, but simply identifies the jerk with impulse control issues. I have three kids and never hit any of them -- I'm sure as hell not going to let some coach on a power trip do so. I'm not against corporal punishment per se, but having consistently received smacks to the face at home and swats at school I can tell you that the only thing I "learned" from the violence is to avoid the assholes that used to hit me.

Zullo issues a formal apology:

https://wnyt.com/top-stories/first-o...ghts-incident/


“I deeply regret my behavior following the loss to La Fargeville Friday night in the Class D state championship game. I want to offer my sincerest apologies to Hailey and her family, our team, the good folks at Northville Central Schools and our community. As a coach, under no circumstance is it acceptable to put my hands on a player, and I am truly sorry. I wish I could have those moments back. I am grateful for the opportunity to have coached girls basketball at Northville the past two years, especially last season, which was a difficult time for our family. I am super proud of every one of these young women and what they accomplished. I know each of them will go on to do great things and I wish them well.”

Yeah. I had a regret on that. Pickup basketball. Bratty short dude on my team kept mouthing everyone. Our team and the other. Shoot from half court constantly. No defense.
I snapped. Grabbed him by his throat and lifted him off the ground. He was maybe 5'2. My senses caught me and I dropped him. He was maybe 17.

Well a few months later that same Tucker got into with another player. Went out into his car and brought in a gun. Thankfully nothing happened. But my ass definitely had him banned. I laughed because dudes yelled at me for snitching. **** that.

That is definitely not the likely explanation. There’s like a 1% chance he goes around tugging players for the last 20 years and it just now gets talked about or noticed.

I work with two gals that are sisters and both played HS and college basketball. Tough girls they are and if they watched this video they would both laugh and then mock anybody pearl clutching over this. These gals aren’t fragile flowers

Yeah because nobody has ever protected a HOF coach before.

Bro. Honestly wtf.

Have you been living under a rock?

Jesus this is almost as funny as the dude that had no idea about contraband cell phones in prison.

I coached my son's football team and my daughter's soccer team. The soccer team was like 13-14 year old girls. I had a problem when they mouthed off, because I didn't feel like I could discipline them, other than bawling them out, which most didn't seem to care about.

The boys on the football team, if they acted up, it was perfectly acceptable and expected that I could grab them by the face mask or shoulder pads and give them a stern talking too. I dunno. If you're dealing with boys, it's different.

This dude should not have yanked the girl's hair. Because she's a girl. That's pretty much it. You don't lay hands on a girl like that. An encouraging pat on the back or arm or whatever, that's fine. But not like that.

Also, I'd never coach girls again. Pain in the ass.

I think that's a pretty common dividing line here - "She's a girl"

Fellas, I absolutely understand if you don't watch girls sports. But let me tell you something - those girls are SAVAGES.

I've developed a theory as I've watched my oldest move up in youth athletics and its mostly that there isn't nearly as much separation athletically. There are some that are just a little more explosive, but by and large, these girls are all pretty similarly athletic.

They just hit a ceiling a bit that very very few of them break through. So for the lucky few that have outstanding coordination, they can 'skill' their way to the next level. But for the majority of them, if they want to stand out, they have to play physical as hell.

Girls soccer and basketball are where I've seen it most. And ultimately its what'll knock my daughter out -- she just isn't willing to scrum and the best girls out there are. These are not wilting little flowers out there -- a bunch these girls are physical and can be mean as hell. And even someone like my daughter, who needs to be a bit more physical, has been pushed to the point by one of those aggressive girls to get an elbow into their back or put a leg out when it wasn't strictly necessary.

I just think we have an odd and fairly arbitrary line we've drawn in a couple ways here. The girl thing being the first but the second is the strict "no touching" rule. And I get it -- that's the rule.

But my HS football coach took ****ing glee in making kids vomit. He would run guys until their legs literally folded under them. And we CELEBRATE that shit. Hell, we do it with Reid when he makes the rookies yack.

That is exponentially more dangerous than a ponytail tug. By FAR. I saw that same coach re-line an Oklahoma drill to set up a big kid to demolish a guy who'd shown up late to practice. He used the damn kid as a weapon. And again, Missouri High School Sports HoFer. And nobody every said boo about ANY of that.

It's just such a nothing line to draw. There's no danger to that girl. Far less than we see from 100 different coaches in 100 different ways. There are coaches that verbally berate their players in ways that will impact them negatively FAR more than what that girl got from having her hair tugged.

{shrug}

I just don't see this as the strict no-fly zone others do apart from the fact that the coaching association rules almost certainly expressly disallow it. But man, we let coaches get away with WAY worse and never give it a second thought.

The girl thing definitely invokes emotions in people, myself included. I don't have a daughter but have two sons who played lots of sports growing up. The closest I can imagine would be if I looked out on the field or court and saw a coach open hand slap them across the face. I would have been flying out of those stands. Would like to think I'd restrain from physically assaulting an 81 year old but he would at least be getting an earful and we'd be out.

I know you're not addressing my post specifically and many are drawing that line, but for the record, I'd want him fired if he did this to a boy, too. I also don't celebrate coaches intentionally putting kids health at risk from exhaustion, either. Chiefs rookies have a whole crew of health care professionals and they are adults so I don't equate that to high school sports.

Boy or girl doesn't matter. She's a kid and he's a grown man. No excuse.

the equivalent of open hand slapping a boy is open hand slapping a girl.

This feels more like a face-mask yank to me. Not a perfect analogue, for sure, but when you have that helmet on the facemask is pretty close to an appendage and there's nothing gentle about yanking a facemask.

Ultimately I'm just saying that these a LOT of these girls are hard as coffin nails out there - tougher than the boys at similar ages. And I think had this coach tugged a kids dreads or had a guy with the 'sunshine' hairdo that he yanked on, folks wouldn't be as outraged.

And I just think it's a distinction without a difference when it comes to the physical toughness of these girls.

And again - I understand that some folks believe a coach should never touch a player. I get it. I just think it's a line that's both overly broad AND not narrowly tailored enough. It doesn't cover FAR more egregious player abuses that we hand-waive all the time and it equates something fairly benign (and yes, I see that ponytail tug as fairly benign) with something akin to a punch.

I think it misses in both directions.

I think it's very easy and appropriate to draw the line at physical violence. Full stop. Player safety issues stemming from other practice techniques is a seperate issue that should receive attention as well.

If my dad were still alive and he saw this coach pull that stunt, and it was his daughter, he would have led the coach out the exit, arm on the coach's shoulder as if all is good and well, and once outside leveled the guy. This is the way.

Think a lot depends on the actual situation and not just the 10 second clip on video. Some reports the coach was mad his team was acting like poor losers, told his team to shke hands and was told to F off. If that is true, meh I would not get that upset if it were my daughter. A slight hair pull seems minor if you told a coach to f off. Now if he got upset for her poor play...that would be another story.

I wonder what Jerry Sandusky's opinion is on this issue.

Lmao.

I'm pretty sure nobody has spoken from a point of oh that girl was hurt, injured, that's so dangerous.

You don't put your hands on someone elses kids bro. It's simple.

Simple.

Is there risk of injury when the wierdo caresses your kids arm? Rubs their shoulders? Sniffs their hair?

No. No injury risk there either, But it's God damn well off mother ****ing limits.

I don't give a **** what my kid says or does. Unless they are in immediate danger, or they are putting someone else in immediate danger, you don't touch my ****ing kid.

It’s not just that the minor is a girl, it’s that the coach is a huge old man. All the false equivalence of a minor male getting yanked around by a male coach is just bullshit. Maybe if Zullo was an old lady this wouldn’t be a story, but facts are he’s an old man, three times this girl’s size, and he severely crosses the line in anger.