Spring is Here!

Posted by Don Trentham, Head Coach

Our spring outdoor season is in full swing, as we have been training outside for the past week and a half. The weather has been very good, it actually reached 70 degrees the past two days, and we have had six productive training sessions. Our focus this spring is going back to basics (technically and tactically), being more consistent in our performances in training and games (i.e. always being at our best) and preparing ourselves to be the 2010 GNAC CHAMPIONS!

As I mentioned above, I believe our training so far this spring has been very productive, and the players are certainly a big reason for that. This group of 16 players seems to be very close and open with each other, has a strong desire to improve and has a competitiveness that inspires everyone to work hard. It’s hard to explain unless you are around it on a daily basis, but you can see the motivation driving them day in and day out. As a result I have seen this team make great strides over the last two months, the six weeks of winter conditioning and the week and a half of outdoor season.

Another big reason the training has gone so well is the coaching staff. Wojtek, Campbell and Gress have been a great addition to the program, and all three of them bring so much experience to our players. It was a great feeling today to look around the field at the beginning of training and see our goalkeepers training with Wojtek, Gress running a warm up activity while Campbell and I are able to give individual feedback to the players. Then when we progressed to the bigger games we were able to implement Campbell, Gress and Wojtek into training to add numbers and a lot of playing experience on the training ground --- one former MLS player/Hermann Trophy winner and two all conference collegiate players.

In terms of our consistency, we are working hard to improve how we play from game to game, as well as how we play from half to half. We know there were games last fall that we let get away from us because we were not consistent in our play. I believe a lot of that came from the fact we had a relatively young team, which is something that we won’t have to worry about next year. However, with that being said, we still have many of the same players returning next fall from last year’s team; they must learn from those experiences in order to make sure we have that consistency this spring in our games and carry it over to the fall.

Lastly, we have one simple goal for the 2010 season --- win the GNAC and go to the NCAA II Tournament (both would be firsts for our program). Our players believe they can do this and also understand the challenge of winning this title in a conference that will be made up of seven other teams with the same goal. We also know that in order to do this we will need to continue to have a productive spring, work hard over the summer and be consistent in the way we play. If we can do that, we know we will be in the running for the GNAC title.

At the end of the day, we are building something special here this spring. While we have a lot of time before our first game next fall, I know everyone is already looking forward to opening day on Thursday, September 2 when we take on Dixie State (UT) in Billings --- a team that participated in the NCAA tournament last fall. Until then, I hope to see some of you out at the field this Sunday when we will be participating in the 7 v 7 MSUB Outdoor Tournament out at our field.