Q: Soccer season just started, how do you feel about this season?
A: We have a lot of new players that are good. We have a lot of returners that I know are good.
Q: Do you have ninth graders trying out?
A: Well, we have always had ninth graders; we have just never had a C-team. This year we will actually have a C-team, which makes me happy because every year we have kids try out and we have to cut so many of them. We usually have about 60 to 70 try out for the team and we usually keep 32 to 34. So we are sending half of them home. This year we have 76 that tried out and we are keeping about 54 of them. It does not make the process easier but at least we are keeping more of them. We still have to send 25 kids home, so we could have a D-team which would be good and it would be fair but the district cannot pay for it.
Q: Do you have any team captains this year?
A: Our captains this year are Trevor Lee, Connor Harriford and Jonathan Contreras. Trevor is a junior and Connor and Jonathan are seniors.
Q: Who was the leader of the team last year?
A: Each year it changes. Last year Jack Rose was a fantastic captain. He and Marcus Wilson were both great captains, they were leader kind of kids. Connor is our returning captain, so he is going to have to step up and fill that position but he has always been a leader on the field. So far he does everything to make people say ‘wow, he is a leader.’ Trevor is our junior captain. He is also a very skilled kid—they all are guys that work hard and buy into the program and do everything we ask. In all honesty we need everybody do be focused on the team game otherwise. It is not like football where you can have great players make up for the slack sometimes we need everyone on the same page.
Q: What made you want to coach for high school sports?
A: Money. I started coaching when I was 19 in college and I was broke. My first coaching job was a high school track job down in Oregon. Everything after that was soccer. My second coaching job was at Kentwood High School as a junior varsity coach. I was still 19 and barely older than anybody I was coaching. My next coaching job was at Lakes High School, which was closer, so I did not have to drive so far. I coached track again for 10 years at Clover Park High School I had a state winner in the 100-meter hurdles and won some State Championships. It was basically just being hungry. Literally hungry, I needed money for food. I had no money and you are trying to come up with money in college but what job can you do when you are taking classes and I was like ‘hey I could do that’ and there you go.