Raider senior to take soccer skills to Connecticut next fall
By: Bob Nuse
Joe Coyle had a great senior year for the Hun School boys’ soccer team.
One can only imagine how much better that year could have been if he hadn’t been playing out of position for most of it.
"In our last game against Peddie we had moved him to the back after they went up on us, 1-0," Hun coach Bob Schwartz said of the Raiders’ state Prep A tournament semifinal. "Once he went back to sweeper, there was no way they were going to score against us. The whole second half he did a great job for us. That’s probably the position he’s most comfortable."
Coyle is most comfortable playing in the back because, other than the games he plays for Hun, that is where he can usually be found on the soccer field.
It’s where he plays when he’s on the field for his club team, the Mercer United. It’s where he plays when he’s involved with the regional team or national pool team. And it’s where he’ll be next year when he’s a freshman at the University of Connecticut.
But at Hun, Coyle was needed up front. The senior responded with a season where he scored 14 goals and assisted on nine others. Those are pretty good numbers by any standards, even more so when you realize he’s not really an offensive player.
Coyle’s outstanding senior year earned him the Princeton Packet Player of the Year.
"I like playing in the back a lot," said Coyle, who transferred to Hun last year after starting his varsity career at Montgomery High. "When the coaches from UConn came to see me they saw me in the back and they felt like that was my best position. I liked being able to play up front this year, because it was different. But I’m used to playing in the back and that’s where I think I play my best."
Coyle plays his best in the back because he has what Schwartz calls a natural feel for the position. It’s Coyle’s instincts on the field that set him apart from other players.
"Chris (Kingston, Hun’s assistant coach) and I wind up practicing with the kids in scrimmages, and there would be days when Joe would mark one of us and make it his personal goal to deny us the ball," Schwartz said. "He has such a great ability to anticipate the play. He would stick with us and anticipate where the ball was going to go.
"He just has a natural feel, which is one of the things that’s hard to teach. It just comes with experience and playing. He can score and he has a great shot, but he’s so good at winning the ball before it even gets to you. That’s the thing that will separate him from others at the next level. It’s pretty fun to watch when you see him doing things that he is really good at."
This fall, for the sake of the team, Coyle played out of position. And he did it very well.
"I enjoyed it," Coyle said of his senior season, which saw the Raiders finish 8-7-1. "I like the team and the kids on the team. I thought we did much better this year. We had a talented team last year, but we weren’t able to put it together."
Next year Coyle will be taking his talent to one of the premier programs in the country when he heads to Connecticut.
"I’m looking forward to it a lot," said Coyle. "I’ve gotten started on the conditioning program they sent me. I’ve been doing a lot of running, anywhere from three to six miles a day. With my club team we’ve played against teams from other countries and some of the best club teams around. UConn is a diverse group of players from different backgrounds. That’s one of the great things about going to play there. Day in and day out at practice you go against great players from all different backgrounds."
Coyle’s own background indicated he would eventually wind up a soccer player. He grew up on Staten Island before moving to Montgomery with his family. His three older sisters, as well as his younger sister all play the sport. His eldest sister Delia is a third-year law student at Seton Hall, while Dierdra is in her first year at NYU medical school and Logan is a junior at Columbia. All three played at Montgomery High. Younger sister Bernadette is a sophomore at Hun.
"When I was young we would play together a lot, but not anymore," said Coyle, who plans to major in education and would eventually like to get into coaching and teaching. "Our parents were always real good about. They had to do a lot of driving us around."
For Joe Coyle, all that effort certainly paid off. Even if he did spend his Hun career playing a bit out of position.
"When I came here last year it was his first year at Hun and it was also my first year," Schwartz said. "I knew he had played defense the year before at Montgomery. I watched him play for a little while and one of the things he was good at was scoring.
"He has a great shot and an ability to get in front of people. He played where we needed him most because it was best for the team."
And in the long run, the sacrifice was probably best for Coyle as well.