Spring to an End.....Let Summer Begin!

"...So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay"

The closing lines from Robert Frost's "Nothing Gold Can Stay" are suitable to define the closing days of our Spring Season (don't think I am some literary genius, or "well read" person so-to-speak, I recall the poem as Ponyboy recited it from The Outsiders...I watched the movie because I was supposed to read the book in middle school...I mean come on are you really gonna read that book or are you gonna watch a movie that has Ralph "Mr. Machismo" Macchio--pre-Karate Kid, Patrick "Nobody puts Baby in a Corner" Swayze--pre-Dirty Dancing, Emilio Estevez--pre-The Breakfast Club, Tom Cruise--pre-All The Right Moves, Rob Lowe--pre-Youngblood, Matt "Gin Phil" Dillon--pre-The Flamingo Kid, and lastly but certainly not leastly (not a word I know this), Ponyboy himself...C. Thomas Howell--pre-Red Dawn. I mean reading is cool and all, but seriously TV is so much better...for all those that think books are better than TV, I have one question for you...have you ever actually seen TV? I mean come on...the best part about TV...no reading!

I digress... (as I often do... or like to do... or kind of have to do since I like to do what it is that I do so much... tired, need a breath? I know reading the 91st Minute can be exhausting, it's a commitment, I've got you on your back heel, I'm in your grill, your pulse is racing, beads of sweat on the head, "is it hot in here or is it just me" you wonder....nope Doug's just about to drop some science--are people still dropping science these days? Man I gotta get with the times...).

Spring is done and graduation is complete! Our non-traditional spring season was a success on the whole. More time together to train and continue to learn one another's personality, as well as build our relationships. I say it all the time, but it really is true, the college environment is such a unique sporting environment...you live together, train together, travel together, eat together, go to class together...so much time together that it really isn't about the sport, but so much more about how we relate to one another and therefore if our relationships are poor, our time together on the field will be a reflection of this as well. So we work at relating to one another...working with one another...pushing one another....keeping one another accountable...and grow with one another around the game we love!

We finished 4-2 in the spring and ended up winning our last game against Seton Hall 1-0, after dropping a game earlier in the day 2-0 to a solid Princeton side. The Princeton game we showed well soccer-wise, but not result wise. We created plenty of chances to score (including Nathan Page's "go-round the goalkeeper and slot home easily only to be cleared off the goal-line by the center back effort"), but I think we lost sight of the end result as we got more and more comfortable with just "playing well" despite being down 1-0 at the half. I reminded the guys at half to stay the course and not lose sight of the end result, which is winning...As I spoke, I could sense that we were getting comfortable in our surroundings, which quite frankly was a little too "Put it on the Underhills" for me (for those that don't know, that is a Fletch reference..."I'll have a steak sandwich and a steak sandwich...")...however, I started to get a little too rev'ed up and as I built up in my speech...my voice grew more forceful....tone got louder...(basically the ging-ger in me took over and the Red Dragon came out)...I told them not to get too comfortable in the friendly confines of Princeton's campus (nothing against you Princeton, it really is a lovely campus and setting...which is lovely), I reminded them that it's not us...and started beating my chest...and spouting off something about how we like to hold it down at 43rd and Powelton... that we're blue collar... etc, etc, etc.... I think I charged up our friend at the back, Tal Bublil, a little too much...as he had a flashback to his mandatory military service and proceeded to take Princeton's Forward, lift him off the ground, and deposit him into one of the training goals that was slightly off the field... um Tal, wrong goal and wrong object deposited in it... So my bad for charging you up too much and Tal's bad for getting sent off for treating their forward like a handbag.

We regrouped between games and talked about the balance of possession vs. purpose with the ball....the balance of playing good soccer vs. getting the result....and the balance of passion vs. being ruled by emotion... I was well pleased to see the team rebound and get the result against Seton Hall in the second game. A great near post header by Mark Donohue off a corner service from Brandon Zeller gave us the lead early on and allowed the team to play with confidence. We created plenty from the run to garner a second goal, but it didn't happen for us. It was great to play with the lead, manage the lead, protect the lead, and eventually secure the result. A good bounce back from earlier in the day.

The spring overall, was a strong showing against teams that all had success this past fall. I truly believe we grew in so many areas....physically, mentally, tactically... First, physically. Strength gains were made in the weight room with Coach Evan Margulies and fitness gains were made with all the soccer-related fitness we did from January to May. It showed in how we played and in particularly, our fortitude in the games.

Perfect segue into the mental improvement.... Knowing full well what they had been committed to through the winter months, our guys went into games with an expectation of winning and succeeding. Not that we always did (as I said we were 4-2, not 6-0), but it was a big change from the tail-end of our season when we were just hanging on and trying not to lose.

Mentality comes from the everyday grind. Spring is a grind. At Drexel, that means the beginning of January until the end of May....lifting, training, fitness. With only five dates per the NCAA, there is very little opportunity to play outside competition. So you grind and get better by committing to the everyday. And you build up mentality...we built that up, shoveling the field at 6:30 am in January so that we could do our fitness for the day. We built it up in the weight room each time Coach Evan challenged the guys to do a little more. We built it up when we trained in the pouring rain...in the freezing cold.... Bottom line, we are stronger mentally now than we were.

Tactically, we grew as a team. Just like Papa John's (better ingredients, better pizza...arguable I know, it's Papa John's we're talking about), better ideas, better soccer. More so, the better we think alike, the better the soccer too. We have a far better understanding of one another's strengths and weaknesses and therefore, a better understanding of how to play with one another. Likewise, we have a better understanding of what the coaching staff expects and demands in how we want to play. Not a finished product by any means, but we are further along for sure and eager for the fall!

Summer is about to go full bore....recruiting....camps....fall season preparation....more recruiting....crazy!

Stay in touch and drop a line if you get the chance. Stay tuned....get excited....more to come....spring season highlights.... fall season schedule....65 Year's of Soccer at Drexel....a late summer Alumni Gathering at a Philly Union game.... and more tom-foolery from your's truly!


Regards,
Coach Hess