Photo by: Seth Seebaugh
Mountaineers Make the Most of Unusual Fall
December 21, 2020 02:00 PM | Men's Soccer
We can all agree that 2020 was anything but normal, and the West Virginia University men's soccer team knows that all too well.
The rollercoaster year began in January, when the squad welcomed a new head coach to the program. Dan Stratford, a London, England, native and member of the men's soccer team from 2004-07, was named the program's 10th head coach on January 20. Along with associate head coach Andy Wright and assistant coach Nick Noble, Stratford jumped right into the spring season, with the 2020 spring slate beginning just over a month after his hiring.
The Mountaineers lost their first spring match at UMBC on March 8, but that paled in comparison to what happened four days later. With the COVID-19 pandemic on the rise in the United States, the collegiate sports world came to a halt on March 12, as the NCAA elected to cancel winter and spring championships, thus signaling the end of the Mountaineers' spring season.
"I came in with intentions to have a really progressive spring," Stratford said. "We made some really good progress over the course of six weeks to two months until we found ourselves in that situation. When looking to implement a new culture and our own playing style, we had a clear vision of what we wanted the spring to look like, but that, of course, had to be disrupted."
Stratford and his team were apart from March until early August, as the players went home to ride out the pandemic. They eventually returned to campus ahead of WVU's fall semester and what they thought would be Stratford's head-coaching debut at the start of the fall 2020 season.
And like many other things in 2020, those plans were rerouted just days before the Mountaineers were scheduled to begin preseason practice. In light of the pandemic, the Mid-American Conference made the decision to postpone its fall sports seasons to the spring, putting Stratford's game plan on the backburner once again.
"Overall, there was a general sense of disappointment, but then a realization that this may have been something that was coming eventually," Stratford recalled of the moment he heard the news. "I wouldn't say I was all that well prepared for the news when it came. It perhaps caught me a little off guard in terms of the timing of it. I thought we could at least start preseason practice."
Sidelined once again, the coaching staff was forced to go back to the drawing board and determine how they would approach the fall. The trio received confirmation from the MAC that they would still be able to hold team practices throughout the semester, so they improvised and scheduled six intersquad scrimmages.
"With 14 new signees and nearly 50% of the squad being brand new, as well as me being relatively new to the program given the limited time we had before the pandemic broke in March, it became a really good opportunity for the players to get comfortable with me and the environment," the first-year coach said. "Having that time – without the consequences of a bad performance or a bad result in a game – has been really beneficial to getting them to a place where we could tell that team chemistry has grown."
The Mountaineers' cleats first touched the grass at Dick Dlesk Soccer Stadium on Sept. 19, playing just under 90 minutes, as the coaches elected to call the first match early. However, as the semester progressed, many players were playing a full, 90-minute match every other Saturday. With 22 of your own guys on the field at once, that leaves just a few players available for substitutions.
The opportunity to play full matches throughout the fall carried with it many benefits, some of which Stratford and his staff hadn't considered at the outset.
"We knew from the beginning that this would be good for the new players, in terms of their integration, but maybe didn't appreciate that it also was going to be good for some of the returners," he said. "When you look at who those returners are, the seven graduating seniors in 2019 contributed to a significant amount of the minutes last year. A lot of these returning players didn't get those opportunities last year, or at least not a great deal of them.
"Then, with intersquad games, you have twice as many of your own players out there at once. I definitely think that's created some opportunities for many of our players. When you look at the reality of had we played a full schedule this fall, would the 20th, 21st or even 22nd guy on our squad have had so many opportunities to be playing 90 minutes? Now, they all have had these opportunities through this semester."
When looking back to where they started the semester to the final Gold-Blue match of the fall on Nov. 13, the coaching staff has seen marked improvements in every area. They saw the stat line improve from game to game, but also the position of the ball on the field and the number of times they could get into the final third and the penalty area, giving the squad increased opportunities to make big plays.
The tactic was simple: keep the ball as close to your opponent's goal and as far away from your own as possible. That was Stratford's philosophy during his time as the head coach at the University of Charleston, and it will remain as such during his time in Morgantown.
And for the Mountaineers, it has become the theme of 2020, as they continue to inch closer to that final goal of a competitive season and further away from the disappointing cancellations of March and August.
When the team returns from winter break in mid-January, they'll have just over a month until the start of the nonconference portion of their 2021 season. Stratford and his staff are expecting the players to retain the strength, stamina and strategies they built throughout the fall in order to be successful once those games arrive in February.
They just need to remember to manage the emotional side of things, too.
"When it comes to that first game of the season, the biggest challenge in mind is the emotional part of it, the excitement, the anticipation and how they deal with that after everything that's happened in 2020. We're definitely excited about not just the spring, but also everything 2021 will hold for this team."
The rollercoaster year began in January, when the squad welcomed a new head coach to the program. Dan Stratford, a London, England, native and member of the men's soccer team from 2004-07, was named the program's 10th head coach on January 20. Along with associate head coach Andy Wright and assistant coach Nick Noble, Stratford jumped right into the spring season, with the 2020 spring slate beginning just over a month after his hiring.
The Mountaineers lost their first spring match at UMBC on March 8, but that paled in comparison to what happened four days later. With the COVID-19 pandemic on the rise in the United States, the collegiate sports world came to a halt on March 12, as the NCAA elected to cancel winter and spring championships, thus signaling the end of the Mountaineers' spring season.
"I came in with intentions to have a really progressive spring," Stratford said. "We made some really good progress over the course of six weeks to two months until we found ourselves in that situation. When looking to implement a new culture and our own playing style, we had a clear vision of what we wanted the spring to look like, but that, of course, had to be disrupted."
Stratford and his team were apart from March until early August, as the players went home to ride out the pandemic. They eventually returned to campus ahead of WVU's fall semester and what they thought would be Stratford's head-coaching debut at the start of the fall 2020 season.
And like many other things in 2020, those plans were rerouted just days before the Mountaineers were scheduled to begin preseason practice. In light of the pandemic, the Mid-American Conference made the decision to postpone its fall sports seasons to the spring, putting Stratford's game plan on the backburner once again.
"Overall, there was a general sense of disappointment, but then a realization that this may have been something that was coming eventually," Stratford recalled of the moment he heard the news. "I wouldn't say I was all that well prepared for the news when it came. It perhaps caught me a little off guard in terms of the timing of it. I thought we could at least start preseason practice."
Sidelined once again, the coaching staff was forced to go back to the drawing board and determine how they would approach the fall. The trio received confirmation from the MAC that they would still be able to hold team practices throughout the semester, so they improvised and scheduled six intersquad scrimmages.
"With 14 new signees and nearly 50% of the squad being brand new, as well as me being relatively new to the program given the limited time we had before the pandemic broke in March, it became a really good opportunity for the players to get comfortable with me and the environment," the first-year coach said. "Having that time – without the consequences of a bad performance or a bad result in a game – has been really beneficial to getting them to a place where we could tell that team chemistry has grown."
The Mountaineers' cleats first touched the grass at Dick Dlesk Soccer Stadium on Sept. 19, playing just under 90 minutes, as the coaches elected to call the first match early. However, as the semester progressed, many players were playing a full, 90-minute match every other Saturday. With 22 of your own guys on the field at once, that leaves just a few players available for substitutions.
The opportunity to play full matches throughout the fall carried with it many benefits, some of which Stratford and his staff hadn't considered at the outset.
"We knew from the beginning that this would be good for the new players, in terms of their integration, but maybe didn't appreciate that it also was going to be good for some of the returners," he said. "When you look at who those returners are, the seven graduating seniors in 2019 contributed to a significant amount of the minutes last year. A lot of these returning players didn't get those opportunities last year, or at least not a great deal of them.
"Then, with intersquad games, you have twice as many of your own players out there at once. I definitely think that's created some opportunities for many of our players. When you look at the reality of had we played a full schedule this fall, would the 20th, 21st or even 22nd guy on our squad have had so many opportunities to be playing 90 minutes? Now, they all have had these opportunities through this semester."
When looking back to where they started the semester to the final Gold-Blue match of the fall on Nov. 13, the coaching staff has seen marked improvements in every area. They saw the stat line improve from game to game, but also the position of the ball on the field and the number of times they could get into the final third and the penalty area, giving the squad increased opportunities to make big plays.
The tactic was simple: keep the ball as close to your opponent's goal and as far away from your own as possible. That was Stratford's philosophy during his time as the head coach at the University of Charleston, and it will remain as such during his time in Morgantown.
And for the Mountaineers, it has become the theme of 2020, as they continue to inch closer to that final goal of a competitive season and further away from the disappointing cancellations of March and August.
When the team returns from winter break in mid-January, they'll have just over a month until the start of the nonconference portion of their 2021 season. Stratford and his staff are expecting the players to retain the strength, stamina and strategies they built throughout the fall in order to be successful once those games arrive in February.
They just need to remember to manage the emotional side of things, too.
"When it comes to that first game of the season, the biggest challenge in mind is the emotional part of it, the excitement, the anticipation and how they deal with that after everything that's happened in 2020. We're definitely excited about not just the spring, but also everything 2021 will hold for this team."
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