Kim Stephenson had an impressive career at the University of Maine that was capped by her being selected to the America East second team her senior year in 2008. Stephenson was an influential midfielder who could both initiate a scoring chance and anchor the defense.
Dylan George was the second-leading scorer for the University of New Hampshire soccer team last fall with four goals and three assists. George is a dangerous striker who can beat defenders one-on-one and slot the ball into the slimmest of corners.
Stephenson, who starred at Hampden Academy, and George, a former Bangor High School standout, are two prime examples of soccer’s growth in eastern Maine over the last 20 years.
They began by kicking a ball around as toddlers. Then they started playing for their respective towns’ recreation programs. From there, it was on to travel soccer, club team soccer and the regional Olympic Development Program.
“When you look at our University of Maine [women’s] soccer team, we have had quite a few players who played their high school soccer in Maine and that’s definitely a testament to how soccer has developed over the years here,” said Stephenson.
Seven of the 25 players on last fall’s Black Bear roster were from Maine. They included leading scorer Laura Martel from Lewiston, Gorham’s Kelsey Wilson and Greenville’s Hannah Breton, who were two of the four players tied for second in scoring, and dependable back Hailey Blackburn from York.
Winslow’s Erin Corey and Scarborough’s Heather Hathorn were exceptional players at Maine in the mid-2000s.
“I have seen soccer grow at all levels,” said Maine women’s coach Scott Atherley. “ Look at the number of kids who are playing youth soccer, not just in this area but in the state of Maine. There are more kids who are registered soccer players. You’ve got clubs around here like the Bangor Soccer Club and Black Bear United who are offering players viable opportunities to participate.
“That has changed dramatically since I first came here [in 1984],” said Atherley. “When I was growing up [in Connecticut], the club season was very much in full blossom. That wasn’t the case in Maine. Now look at all the programs being offered for kids in Maine.”
There are 9,600 registered soccer players in the state, according to Charles Fischman, the executive director of SoccerMaine, the governing body of youth soccer in Maine, “And that’s been steady the last three to five years,” said Fischman.
He was also quick to add that the number is misleading.
“It doesn’t include the number of kids playing recreational soccer in most communities. The only recreational players we have registered under SoccerMaine are from Portland, Waterville, Windham, Lewiston-Auburn and Massabesic [Waterboro]. And it doesn’t include players who just play for their school teams,” explained Fischman.
Black Bear United aids growth
One of the clubs that has made a dramatic difference in the talent upgrade has been Black Bear United, founded in 2001 by M.J. Ball and former Maine men’s coach and current Maine Maritime Academy men’s and women’s coach Travers Evans.
“We started with three teams and 66 players. Now we have 16 teams and 325 players,” said Ball. “Travers and I had been involved in club soccer as players and coaches so we got our heads together and said let’s start a program and see how it goes.”
Three of their teams qualified for the State Cup finals on Sunday in Portland and four others have qualified for the semifinals.
“We have had 106 players from our program go on to play college soccer,” said Ball proudly.
Black Bear United has players from more than 50 towns, according to Ball.
“M.J. has done a terrific job with that program,” said Fischman.
Fischman speculated one of the reasons Black Bear United has been so successful is it has established continuity as the result of its remote locale.
Players in the southern part of the state have more teams to choose from so they don’t get the opportunity to play with the same players as often as players with Black Bear United do, he explained.
“The creation of Black Bear United has really helped in this area,” said Stephenson, whose younger sister Michaela plays for Black Bear United. “My sister really enjoys it. They train in Orono and you get good coaching. Jackie [Maine assistant women’s coach Jackie Gebhart] used to coach and M.J. is a real good coach. You get to play better competition, including some top teams from out of state.”
Club soccer builds skills
Part of the draw of club soccer is the development of its players.
George said playing club soccer is “very important if you want to succeed at the next level. You can’t just play high school soccer.”
George and Kim Stephenson each played for a variety of club teams, including the Waterville-based Terriers Soccer Club.
Before playing on a club team, it is important for youngsters to enjoy their first exposure to soccer.
Many start in their school’s recreation program.
The Bangor Soccer Club was founded in 1993 and has a spring and fall program.
Angela Bowen, registrar for the Bangor Soccer Club, said the club has 780 kids on 78 teams registered for their six-week spring program.
The spring program has just one theme, explained Rod Towne, president of he Bangor Soccer Club.
“It’s to have fun,” said Towne. “It’s the first soccer experience for a lot of the kids, the 4-to-5-year-olds. They’ve never been on an organized team before.”
Towne said they have strict guidelines on parental behavior to ensure that the kids enjoy their experience.
“The philosophy is excellent,” said David Patterson, the former UMaine women’s soccer coach who has led the Bangor High School boys soccer team to an Eastern Maine Class A title and an EM Class A runner-up showing in his first two seasons.
Patterson’s 6-year-old son, Jack, is involved in the program.
“There aren’t any goalkeepers and they don’t keep score. They have smaller-sided games so the kids get a lot of touches on the ball. My guy has a smile on his face the whole time he’s running around,” said Patterson.
“You go to the Union Street fields on any given Sunday [in the spring] and there are hundreds of kids running around. That bodes well for the future. The more players you have at a young age having a good experience, the more likely they’ll stick with it,” said Patterson.
The Bangor Parks and Recreation Program has two programs, a Mighty Mites program in May for 2-to-6-year-olds that has attracted 110 youngsters and a fall program for youngster from kindergarten through fifth grade. Tim Baude from the Bangor Parks and Rec Department said they had 300 last fall.
The players are carrying over their skills and love of the game to high school.
Bangor High School athletic director Steve Vanidestine implemented a freshman soccer program for boys and girls four years ago to go with the varsity and JV programs and it has paid huge dividends.
“We felt there were some [freshmen] who weren’t confident enough to try out for the JV teams so we established freshman teams and the numbers went way up,” said Vanidestine, who noted there are approximately 130 players playing on the six teams.
“It has been a nice story.”
The freshman teams play high school JV teams in the Bangor area and have 12- to 14-game schedules.
They are the only freshman teams north of Waterville.
He also said the six soccer teams had a combined grade point average above 3.6.
Hampden was model program
Soccer’s growth got a big boost in the Greater Bangor area in 1991 when Lou Janicki and his family moved to Hampden from Londonderry, N.H.
“Londonderry had a very strong travel program. My son, Ryan, played for the Londonderry Express,” said Janicki, who had another son, Tom, who also played.
Dewey Martin of Hampden had already been trying to establish a travel program, so the two of them joined forces and came up with two boys teams: Under-12 and Under-13.
“The Hampden kids were very good athletes so when we played other teams from this area, we dominated. We started taking the teams around New England. We found out that we weren’t only competitive in Maine, we were competitive everywhere,” said Janicki.
Janicki had also called Keith Bosley, the current women’s soccer coach at Husson University in Bangor, and got him involved. Bosley started a couple of girls travel teams, since he had two daughters who played.
Carol Woodcock and Kevin Frazier were among a group of parents on the west side of Bangor who started the Bangor Travel Club after spending one year under the umbrella of Hampden. They had a U-12 boys and U-12 girls team.
That eventually became the Bangor Soccer Club.
“That was a model for everybody. It’s a real nice program,” said former Brewer High School coach Mike Jeffrey, who ran a Central Maine Summer Soccer League team for high school and college-aged players for several years.
Indoor facilities beneficial
Janicki eventually built a hockey arena [Bouchard Arena[ in Brewer and when hockey season ended and the ice was taken out, he put down carpeting and started indoor soccer leagues.
Three Englishmen, Peter Madigan, Gary Walker and Mark Franchi, built the Maine Sports Complex in 2002 and the 33,000-foot indoor facility, with a Sprinturf surface, housed soccer leagues and other sports for five years before financial troubles forced it to close.
The Mahaney Dome on the UMaine campus opened in 2005 and, four years later, Atlantic Sports Group President Cheryl Stokes was involved in building the Field4Kids indoor facility on the Beal College campus in Bangor.
The advantage of having indoor facilities, which have taken the place of gyms and armories where soccer used to be played in the winter and still is in some cases, is that players can play soccer year-round now.
Stokes was responsible for bringing the Maine Tide of the Women’s Premier Soccer League and Maine Sting of the National Premier Soccer League to the Bangor area in 2008, exposing local soccer fans with high-quality soccer entertainment in the summer.
Coaching, TV boost soccer
Orono High School girls soccer coach Cid Dyjak, who used to own the Absolute Soccer shop in Old Town, said the growth of soccer has been dramatic.
“It has grown a great deal,” said Dyjak. “The youth players are coming in [to high school] with a lot more skill and understanding of the game. They have gotten a lot more sophisticated as far as the decision-making process is concerned. And the games are more well-attended.”
He credits “better coaching at the youth level” and soccer’s increased TV exposure with aiding the soccer development.
“And the passion for soccer is getting there, too,” he said.
That passion will be fueled by the World Cup beginning next month.
Soccer is the nation’s fifth most popular high school sport, participation-wise, on the boys and girls side. In the 2008-2009 season, 383,824 boys played high school soccer and 344,534 girls participated.
The growth of soccer has meant many more coaches have a soccer background these days.
Dyjak said another vital component has been the willingness of prominent coaches like former Maine men’s coaches Jim Dyer and Atherley to share information and knowledge with coaches and players.
“They want to advance the game and that has been terrific,” said Dyjak.
“Soccer is a real community and that’s what’s neat about it,” said former Bangor High boys coach Adam Leach.
Leach had the distinction of becoming the first coach north of Fairfield to win a Class A state championship when he led Bangor to the 2006 title.
He said attitudes toward soccer have changed over the years.
“Kids used to play soccer to keep themselves in shape for basketball. Now kids consider themselves soccer players first,” said Leach. “And soccer has become more accepted. Soccer used to be a sport for kids who didn’t play football. The players here before I got here gave the program a lot of respect and earned integrity and re-spect for it.”
Low cost a big plus
Soccer’s lure as far as a participatory sport is concerned is based on several plusses.
“From a startup standpoint, it’s very inexpensive,” said Atherley. “All you need is shinguards and cleats. It doesn’t put a [financial] burden on the family. And you don’t have to be big to play.”
“Anyone can play,” said Ball.
Bosley pointed out that you can go out and kick a soccer ball at any time and in virtually any place.
Playing travel soccer is more costly than recreational soccer but administrators try to keep the costs reasonable.
Ball said Black Bear United U-10 and U-11 teams require a $500 fee and the older teams charge $750.
But he was quick to point out soccer clubs in Portland ($1,500) and Seacoast ($2,000) are much more expensive. The fee for three nine-week (two practices a week) sessions for youngsters 4-10 is $165 although players who attend more than one are charged $125.
One of the other lures, according to several of the coaches, is that players are always involved in the game especially when they have smaller-sided games (i.e. 6 vs. 6). They aren’t standing around with nothing to do.
They also said you use more players than you do in other sports like basketball and baseball.
The game has evolved, also.
Brian Higgins took over as the head coach of the boys team at Ellsworth High School in 1974.
He has become one of the state’s winningest coaches and has four state championships.
“When I started coaching, we used a 2-3-5 formation,” said Higgins referring to two fullbacks, three midfielders and five strikers. “Now teams play a 5-3-2.”
He noted the soccer’s TV presence has increased dramatically and that has been important in its growth.
“You can find a game on TV almost every single day,” he said.