Well this season was interesting, to say the least. After months of wondering if we would even have a season, the greenlight was given and almost immediately we were off and running. It was a whirlwind. It was different. It was weird. It was a lot of work! But in the end we got what we all wanted, which was some kind of season for the boys. While there are so many things I missed about our “normal” season (and at times this season was stressful and frustrating), I will be forever grateful that we did have some kind of season in 2020, especially for our seniors. Spring sports were not so lucky. I told my wife from the beginning that my motto would be “Any season is better than no season” and that she should remind me of that any time things didn’t go as I would like. I wish that it could have been different. I wish we could have had more time with all teams. And I definitely wish we could have held our usual off the field events and had the JV and varsity players intermingle. But we all had to make sacrifices and in the end we did whatever we had to do in order for the boys to be able to play.
There are a lot of thank yous that need to go out to make this season happen. A big thank you first to the rest of the coaching staff. More was asked of them this year, and while we didn’t agree with everything, we did whatever we were asked to keep going. I also know the coaches made a lot of sacrifices in their personal lives. Not only for their own health and safety, and that of their families, but also because we all agreed we didn’t want to be the ones who forced us to stop. Another big thank you goes out to Jenni and our athletic training team. So much has been asked of her this year, and even though our season was much shorter, it was also extremely condensed and compact. Combine this with very dense schedules from other sports and our athletic trainers have been worked and worked and worked. Without them our season wouldn’t have been possible. Thank you to our Lafayette administration for their continued support and for working with us to formulate plans and policies for our athletic events. And especially thank you for supervising all of our events in our short and compact season. Thank you to our booster board and all of the volunteer parents. Again, more was asked of you and there were probably some responsibilities that were not the most comfortable. I know it was far from the season you envisioned for your son, but without you and without you willing to do whatever was asked, the boys don’t get to play. Also thank you for making life easy on everyone at Lafayette by following whatever rules were handed down by KHSAA and FCPS. Finally, thank you to the players. They followed all rules in place, with some encourgaing of course (they are teenagers after all!). We had little to no attitude issues across all teams. And we had very little attendance issues. There have been past years where this kind of season would have been incredibly challenging. But in the end they wanted to play. They wanted to be around their teammates. And they wanted some semblance of normalcy in their lives. I hope the season gave it to them.
Now on to some season summaries from my perspective for each team.
JV RED
I thoroughly enjoyed watching our JV Red squad this year. Unfortunately I could not be as involved with these guys as I normally am, as we were trying to keep JV and varsity coaches separated from players we were not coaching just to be careful. But it was obvious they had great chemistry and a great spirit through the team. It was one of the more talented third teams we have had since I’ve been at Lafayette, and we expect many of these players to make big impacts on the program during their high school careers. They were competitive in every single game, and could have won every single game, which has not always been the case in past years. Also, in what will be a reoccuring theme, this was a pretty young JV Red team with only 2 sophomores on the roster. This bodes well for the future and we are really excited about what the program can potentially look like down the road. We have a lot of very good young players in the program and it will be fun to watch their development. Great job Coach Nathan and all of the JV Red players!
Final Record: 4-3-2
Goals For: 16
Goals Against: 12
JV NAVY
Our JV Navy squad was very strong this year, and they played some very nice soccer throughout the season. Over the course of the season I believe they proved they were in the top group of JV teams in the city, right there with Dunbar and Henry Clay as the top 3. And again, this was a pretty young JV team, relatively speaking. Most of the time when we have a strong JV Navy team the makeup of the roster is very sophomore heavy. This year almost a third of the roster were middle school players! That is really exciting. Again, I couldn’t be as involved with this group as I normally might be but it was great to see some strong bonds formed off the field. That chemistry will really make a difference down the line as all of these players get older. The future is bright! Great job to Coach Adam and William and preparing our next group of varsity players!
Final Record: 6-2-3
Goals For: 23
Goals Against: 7
VARSITY
This varsity season is going to be one of those “What If” seasons for me for a long time. What if we could have had a normal season with this group? What if we didn’t suffer some really bad luck the week of districts? In the end none of this matters, but it’s still one of those things as coaches we end up thinking about. There was a great opportunity this year to really make noise in our region, and we felt really confident in being able to do so. With such a short preseason and no “tune up” games before we played rival district (and now region champion) Dunbar in our first game, we really had no idea what to expect going into the season. And even though we lost that game 2-0, I knew immediately that we would be in the hunt all season. A couple of moments decided that game, but we played well and evenly competed throughout the 80 minutes. The second half especially was an impressive performance by our guys. Our district proved to be brutal, as usual, and almost every game was incredibly tight. But by the end of the season we were playing our best soccer and performed so well during the week of districts. If not for a devastating injury to Gabe in district finals, I truly believe our results over the last 2 games would have been different. But injuries are part of the deal and it can happen to anyone at anytime. However, even without our best offensive player we still proved we were right there with the 2 perceived region favorites (which proved to be correct) in back to back games. We had a great opportunity to win the district championship and I was so proud of the boys and how they competed in the last game against Henry Clay. After losing the district finals in the fashion we did, losing Gabe to an injury, and then drawing the hardest possible game in our first region game, heads could have been hung. But they went out and gave HC all they could in a game that had very minimal opportunities for either team, and could have went either way. No regrets with how we ended the season, and we proved we were one of the best in the region during the postseason. Advancing out of our district is one of the toughest things to do in the state!
YOUTH WAS SERVED
We had a young and inexperienced varsity team. In our last game against Henry Clay we started 2 freshman and 3 sophomores. Considering how even that game was and how senior heavy HC was, that is a great sign for moving forward. But it also leaves the staff wondering what could have been if we had more time to work and develop our younger players. Even though we were playing our best in the postseason, I truly believe it was just the tip of the iceberg for many individuals and our team overall. This was the kind of group that could have really used the extended practice time in preseason and additional game experience. Huge props to our guys for coming a long way in a short amount of time!
THANK YOU SENIORS!
I told the boys after the last game that we owe so much to our seniors for the season we had. With a lot of additional administrative duties put on the coaching staff, that took a lot of energy away from focusing on the soccer aspect of coaching, especially early on, and of course we couldn’t do some of the intentional team building activities off the field that we normally do. I’m not sure I was able to really focus on soccer specifics until almost a month into the season. We leaned heavily on the seniors to help build the culture, bring our young players along, and do what they could to develop chemistry. Some years this would prove to be very challenging, but our seniors did a fantastic job bringing the entire group along. Also credit goes out to our younger players for being willing to follow our seniors along the way.
In the end this is a group that I personally wish we would have had more time with. Yes, the soccer potential was exciting and clear. Give us another month and I can only imagine the level we might have achieved! But more importantly this group of young men was fantastic to coach and get to know. The most disappointing thing with our season ending was knowing that we wouldn’t get to spend another day with this group together. This was a different kind of season and one I know none of our players imagined. We had to manage it much differently than in past years without Bluegrass State Games, preseason scrimmages, and additional regular season games. This also means it impacted certain individuals differently as we tried to balance individual experience and team goals. I am very grateful for all of the players’ willingness to show up and work at every practice, and the great support they gave all of their teammates. This was a special group of young men.
Final Record: 6-8-1 (top 5 strength of schedule)
Goals For: 28
Goals Against: 23
43rd District Runner Up
WHAT’S NEXT?
We just received word that we will be able to hold some kind of banquet to celebrate the season. There will be restrictions in place, all which applied during the season, so the staff and booster board will be discussing our options and how we can make some kind of banquet happen. Be on the lookout for an announcement over the next few weeks.
From what I understand offseason practices and workouts are on hold, so don’t expect any offseason activities to take place any time soon. Typically we hold some gym futsal sessions during the winter months, but I’m not sure if that will happen this year. If things change we will look to schedule practices at some point. We will usually start outdoor practices after spring break, but again all of that is probably on hold at the moment.
Club soccer will get underway very soon, and while there is no requirement from our end in playing club, we do encourage as many players to be involved as possible. From the options available, this is the best environment to continue development in the offseason. Remember we only get the boys officially for 3 months out of the year, so growth and development is based a lot on what the boys are doing in those other 9 months. If any players need help finding a place for the winter/spring please let the coaching staff know and we will do everything we can to help each player find a team. Clubs will probably be holding supplemental tryouts in the coming month, espcially since tryouts didn’t really happen this summer, so be on the lookout for those announcements. We will send those out to the program as we become aware.
Thank you to everyone for making the best out of the season. As much as it was a joy to see the boys return to some normalcy, it was also a blessing to be a part of the ride during this crazy year. I am honored each and every season to be the head coach of this program. It is only as good as the people involved, and we have incredible people! #readyfor2021already
