The North Meck Men’s Varsity Soccer team is more than halfway through its 2023 season. They’re sitting in third place right now in their conference, with Hough and Hopewell just in front of them. As of writing, they have an overall record of 8-7 and a conference record of 6-2. The success of this team can be attributed to the players' performances and Coach Roach as well. He started coaching the team last year, leading them to a win against Hough that ended the long-lasting streak of rivalry losses dating back to 2012.
Even though the North Meck Men’s Varsity team has played great this year, they cannot win the conference. They can still tie, but as Coach Roach says about that scenario: “You’re technically conference champs but they’re picking out of a hat to decide who gets that top seed.” Knowing that the team won’t win this year is not what they were hoping for. But Roach explains that "it's just added motivation for next year.” They will look for that tie before they start back up optional practices beginning in March and going throughout May and then Summer workouts starting mid-June.
This level of play and change in confidence has not come overnight; however, the team has been working harder than they ever have these past two seasons because the bar has been raised for what is asked of them. Roach explains that the hardest thing he faced when becoming the coach was “getting the guys to be committed.” With new commitments, Roach was able to build on the talent the players already possessed and give them a fighting chance at showing what they’re truly capable of accomplishing. Roach says that “you have to sacrifice time and effort and what you’re doing outside of school and all that to be at practices and be involved with each other and actually be friends with each other, and that took a bit of time but [we] eventually got the right people involved.” Roach reiterated that soccer is a team sport, and a player not only has to be committed to the team but to their peers and coach as well to be as successful as they can be.
During the past two years, there has been a lot of improvement for the players and Coach Roach as well. Roach says: “Last year I was probably a little more stubborn and we played a certain style throughout the year and stuck to it. This year because of who we’ve been playing, we’ve been playing much better teams, I’ve kind of had to adjust on a game by game basis as to who’s where and who’s doing what and how we’re playing as a team collectively.” He says that “[our playing style is] a bit more fluid instead of concrete every single game.” This structure allows the team to play at a high level every game, allowing them to grow as individual players and as a team.
The improvement in the last two years has been schoolwide news; not only have the players recognized the change, but everyone around them did too. Before Coach Roach’s arrival, the team was a strong candidate for one of the worst sports teams North Meck had; the players lacked chemistry on and off the field, and that reflected on game scores. A former North Meck student, who graduated in 2021 and played for the team said: “We had no chemistry, no organization, and zero communication.” Coach Roach’s impact was immediate: the players communicate, and the scores will keep improving as the team seems to be more united than it ever has in the last decades.
Overall, the North Meck Men’s Soccer varsity team has been going through a great season and has what looks like a bright future ahead of them. They’re committed to finishing the season strong and working as hard as they can in the offseason to finally win that conference title once and for all. 🆅