Pride of the Pitch Blog
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Soccer in the Lehigh Valley and Pocono's
As the districts playoffs start for high school in the Lehigh Valley and the Poconos I wanted to talk about not only high school soccer, but club soccer as well for the two areas. My first taste of high school soccer came from watching my two older brothers play at Pleasant Valley High School in the early 90's. At the time they both played for good teams but my brother Chris' team was slightly better. I remember thinking they played amazing soccer and no one could beat them, then they made it to Districts and got beat by a much better Liberty team. It was then that I got my first taste for soccer in the Lehigh Valley and soon after realized they had a leg up on the soccer played in my neck of the woods. As soccer became more serious for me I started to study the game more and saw how teams in the Valley were built around short passes and creative one-two's, through balls, and overlaps. The primary weapon of choice for the Pocono's was the tried and true long ball to the fast forward, and you knew you were going to get hit when the played the country boys!
As I entered High School in the late 90's not much had changed in the styles of play as I began my freshman year at Pleasant Valley HS. I now had a front row seat to the styles of play and my observations made just a few years earlier were still the same. It was not for lack of effort on our part, meaning we tried to string passes together, but in times of desperation we returned to our instincts.
It was two things that finally made a huge difference in the style of play in the Pocono area, and please excuse my bias. I firmly believe that teams in the area that are now competitive have benefited mainly because of: Stroudsburg United Soccer Club (Thank You Kevin Yost), and quality coaches returning to coach High School soccer. First the issue of SUSC: they saw the need for organized soccer in the Poconos and developed a club that focused on the right way to play. It took a couple of years but with the addition of Perugia to the club it makes a world of difference in the HS game. The second quality coaches returning to the game: coaches like James Ellison, Eric Buksa, and Tim Hall (Easton coach but great example) played the game at a high level and it has shown through for their teams. They have based the knowledge and experience they had learned from the college game onto the players and it shows (give ES North some time and they will be right there).
All said the soccer has become better and the Pocono teams are now competing with the Lehigh Valley teams that have benefited from great clubs such as Lehigh Valley United for years. In the next five years I foresee the Pocono teams battling for the District title and winning at least two out of the next five. Maybe PV or Stroudsburg can start the trend this year.
Past Blogs:
October