The fall 2023 season will be our fifth season as a club. While it feels like we have been an organization for much longer, our short history is a great success story. The commitment from the community, our families, and the High School has allowed us to grow while building a sustainable foundation for the future. Let's take a look back at how we became a club, where we are today, and what is next for our organization in the next 5 years.
Birth of NCSC
In Spring of 2019 Brian Girdlestone and Steve Bell came together to place three teams in Ohio Travel Soccer under the Jackson Fury name, two girls teams, and one boys team. Tom Strock, the president of Jackson Fury, allowed us to play three sessions under the Jackson Fury name until we had the organization register our own club’s players and coaches (thanks Leta!). The league allowed us to do this with the promise that when we were ready we would be NCSC at the beginning of the 2020-21 season. Brian recruited Matt Miller and Jon Zahn to join this endeavor as we were all on staff as high school coaches together. We were committed to learning from the past attempts at building a North Canton Soccer Club. Previous attempts focused on Middle School players for the quickest impact on the High School. We decided to focus on the youngest players ages 4-7.
Our goal for 2019 was simply to make it to 2020 and become our own free-standing club. We started the Academy program, knowing we were competing with Community Soccer and the YMCA, which were established programs. We had very low expectations for registration numbers. We hoped to keep the three spring teams for travel and get 40 kids for the academy. We ended up with 5 travel teams and over 80 players signed up for the academy. It was an overwhelming result. We had to add academy coaches Jenna Bond, Charlie Bond, Ky Fallick, and Alex Bodenschatz. We added another two boys teams with Jon and Pete Vandervaart joining the coaching staff. This group is still around today as a testament to the commitment of the soccer community within North Canton.
From 2020 through 2022 our goal was to continue to develop the foundation of our program and ensure we would continue to exist in year five. We started partnerships with Soccer.com, Sonic Stitching, 4.40 Performance, and Blue Coats (Champion Events) to solidify our operations with minimal staff required. We invested in our academy by taking care of our coaches, modifying our programs, and having players ready for travel at the U9 level. Our travel program continued to gain interest, including dual carded club players. The addition of the boy’s ID program added a new dimension to bring North Canton players together. We added experience to our coaching staff as well as some parent support as head or assistant coaches. We expanded our board to help serve the club better and offer more opportunities. We added a Facebook page (Lauren Conners), the 4th of July parade (Beth Kostur), club picnics (Megan Wilson), and fundraiser events (Megan Wilson). Our community is committed to investing in and supporting our club!
Where are we now?
By the 2022-23 season we began to see the fruits of our commitment to training our youngest players well. We had our first group of 4-5-year-olds in 2019 enter the travel program as a cohort. Our girls and boys travel programs were at their peak. The entire club was played a quality brand of soccer, thanks to our coaches. The board was a high-functioning operation with everyone knowing their roles and executing well together. We did field improvements to Champion, allowing us to offer more space this fall.
We continued to add partnerships with The Wood’s Edge for Fusal and Walsh University for U11 and above teams. This gave us our own spaces allowing us scheduling freedom, higher-quality fields, and operational efficiencies. We introduced two new programs, Futsal and Goalkeeper training, that expanded our ability to develop players. Our in-house Futsal program produced results as players developed more sound fundamentals, increased their speed of play, and came together as a group to get to know each other better. We expanded our travel coaching staff with former Academy coaches continuing to build on the strong fundamental focus.
Coming into year five we are strong and ready for the next five years!
The Future
Our future is what is making us successful today. We are a community travel club that wants to support lifelong successful soccer players. We want to build a pipeline for our High School program and give players an environment to develop to their full potential. As a club, our focus will not change moving forward and we will resist deviation from our course. We will be looking to build our offerings to players: academy, travel, goalkeeper training, and Futsal.
We do not plan to grow much from our current size. We would like to add a few more girls teams and one more boys team at the U10 or under level. We do not have plans to get that much bigger in terms of player numbers. We plan to stay in Ohio Travel with other community programs and look to support other area programs as they develop, including the return of Lake Soccer Club. Just like Fury helped us start, we want to pay it forward to promote community-based soccer in our area.
We want to continue to improve the soccer we play and increase the divisions we play within the league. We are committed to a development-first program. We will play good quality soccer, win or lose. We have a talented enough coaching staff to tactically win most games we play but we are not going to jeopardize development in the name of winning. We will continue to invest in the academy which is getting a revamped curriculum this fall to match the changing player development standards. The goalkeeper and Futsal programs will continue and evolve as they mature.
I want to close with a thank you to all who have been on this journey with us. It hasn’t and won’t always be smooth but this group has the passion and commitment to drive soccer forward in North Canton. We are always here for our players and their families. We are open to change and the evolution of our club. We strive to do our best in planning training, communication, and programs offered. We are always looking for more volunteers and support from our families. If you are looking to get involved please reach out. Here is to many more years of soccer here in North Canton. LET’S GO VIKES!