Communications and Social Media Director
STEP Developmental Program
One program that I have loved coaching with for the past three years has been the Sting Timbers Elementary Program (STEP). STEP is specifically designed to follow the US Youth Soccer curriculum in order to get the youngest players in the club prepared and excited for the upcoming levels of soccer. When parents leave their children at STEP, they can expect a professional, well organized practice plan that always incorporates the most important expectation at this age...FUN. Our goal is to get players excited about soccer and looking forward to coming back each week. The next session of STEP will run two days a week from November 5th through December 11th for birth years 2014, 2015, and 2016. The $90 registration fee includes six sessions, a STEP t-shirt, and be held inside the new TTNFC indoor center.
Thorns-Timbers Town Hall
In May 2016, Sting Timbers became Timbers-Thorns North FC as the second Idaho club to join the Adidas Portland Timbers Alliance. Many people weren't even sure what this meant besides a new logo and gear. On November 20th and 21st, two coaches from the Portland Timbers came to Coeur d'Alene to help with coaching education, scouting for Academy teams, and inform the local community about what it truly means to be an alliance team.
My role was to get word out about the Thorns-Timbers Town Hall on the 20th via social media to the community and then document as much as possible about the trainings. The November 20th trainings included the 05 girls being coached by Kyle Steinbaugh, Timbers Academy Director, and the 04 boys were coached by Mike Smith, Portland Timbers Youth Director. On Thursday the 02/03 boys and 04 girls trained from 4:00 to 5:30 and 05 boys and 02/03 girls from 5:45 to 7:15 with Kyle and Mike again, respectively. During the trainings, both coaches had high expectations as they moved through the stages of the training from warm-ups, to small sided games, to larger activities that usually took up half the field. In between drills Kyle and Mike would come over to go over plans and methodology of the trainings and be available for questions.
After training on November 20th, the big event was happening at the TTNFC indoor center. The director's and I were hopeful that that we had all communicated to the community, parents, and players that this would be a wonderful opportunity to realize the impact of being an alliance club on and off the field, but we really were not sure how it would turn out. It was the best we could hope for - the seats were filled and people were even standing! Kyle was the main presenter of the evening after a short introduction by Mike. He went through a slideshow discussing the beginning of the Adidas Timbers Alliance Clubs, what they look for in teams to partner with, successes to date, and future goals. For me, the line that stood out to me the most for the evening was how their goal is to "create a culture of excellence on and off the field." Many athletes focus on individual and team successes that can be measured on the score board. He discussed while that is great, the people they become and the life skills the develop are more important. He prefers teams that strive for a greater positive impact on the community and those around them rather than just a winning record.
The next day, I asked Mike how he thought it went. He said we were extremely successful at promoting the Town Hall meeting and he had received positive feedback from those that attended as well. The parts he was disappointed about were "minor imperfections" that other people might not have noticed such as coaches not enforcing the training gear expectations (matching colors, other team logos, etc.), forgetting the extra bag of cones and balls, and only a few coaches showing up each night or parents not following through on bringing their kids to trainings which created a challenge with numbers. Overall though, he was very happy with how it all went and is a good building block for the future.
College Information Night
I didn't know this, but the club previously had a college adviser who was the connection for athletes who wanted to play at the next level. Many people, including myself in early high school, thought that college recruits just showed up to games and if you were good enough they'd recruit you to come play for them. While this may be true in some situations, the majority of athletes need to initiate contact with college coaches. This night was organized to educate young players and parents about how to make the most out of the college recruiting process and what to expect as a college athlete.
The event was held at Lake City High School in Coeur d'Alene in their auditorium. The college coaches that attended were from North Idaho College, Gonzaga University, Eastern Washington University, and Community Colleges of Spokane as well as a Life Skills Coordinator from Gonzaga. Around 70 people showed up, approximately a 40/30 split players to parents. For being the first one of these information nights, we were happy with this turnout. The downside was we were surprised that some players who are capable of going to the next level and have expressed interest did not attend. Another challenge was having parents sign in for their kid, but the kid was not in attendance. For the next one we will try to stress the importance of having the player there with their parent since the information is for them and their parent assistance is more of a bonus.
Afterwards Vito said he felt that everything went smoothly for the most part. He was happy with the panel of coaches that came in and how thoroughly and efficiently they answered the audience questions. It was great how the coaches made sure to keep the focus on the athletes rather than what the parents wanted for their player. One of the questions that stood out was a parent asking what parents should expect when they go on a recruiting trip and if their player joins that team. The coach answered that he rarely talks to parents while recruiting and during their tenure at their college. This was not meant to be rude, but he made sure that his point got across that it was the student being recruited, not the parents.
