Soccer Coach

I first coached soccer for AYSO.  I coached the team from Hyrum, 11 and 12 year olds.  I did not grow up with soccer, so this was all learning for me.  I coached kids from the community.
However after I was a father, I coached my kids.  This was in the Cupertino, West San Jose league.  I would usually coach them until about 12, and then hand them over to others who had been coaching longer.  I figured they would have more to teach them.
Major League Soccer would send people to give trainings every year.  These trainings would include material to help with organizing practice.  They would give books with suggested games.  I also purchased a book, Soccer Practice games: 120 games for technique, Training and Tactics by Joe Loxbacher.  I found parts of this book very helpful.  Others too advanced for the age I was teaching.  Crab soccer was always a favorite, and taught both positioning and endurance and strength.  I also liked some of the throw-in games, ass well as the go games.  Some of the warm=up activities would include dribbling and then squash the ball, or side-to-side, or "I've got an injury."  This would help with stretching.
I must admit, I ways always offensive minded in soccer.  I had difficulty teaching defensive skills.  However over the years I got better at this.  I think I coached most of my kids, Mark and Jeremy and Caleb for sure.  Also Charity played for me one year, and Sheri coached Miranda one year.  My kids wee always some of the better on the team.  We played in the district tournament several years, meaning we took first or second.
I always enjoyed this.  When the kids were older, I converted to officiating.  I use to particularly enjoy lines, but I did officiate in the middle as well.

Youth Soccer and Tournaments

I came across an article in the Deseret News with regards youth soccer and tournaments.  I am not a great fan of soccer tournaments.  They are played on Saturday and Sunday, and I always had a problem with Sunday games.  Also the organizers often pit teams of unequal ability which is really not fun for either team.  I remember one son playing a highly advanced team and the score was so lopsided by half time that the coach spent the second half working on an off sides trap to try and keep the other team at bay.  Not a fun game.  In the article a pediatric doctor Scott Pugh.  He points out another negative is the time spent in cars traveling to the tournament rather than participating in the sport.  Most important perhaps, the doctor also says participating in more than two games a week increases the risk of injury by six times.  Tournaments often involve four or five games in a weekend.   There must be some better alternatives.  

First Year for Bridgerland Youth Soccer: 1976

With who as many people who play soccer now, it is hard to believe  this was not always the case.  My brothers and I did not play soccer growing up, but I was coaching it as a young man.  The article from the Hyrum Crusader does not name me, but if Weldon was doing something, I was doing something.  When Peter Banks moved to our community, he took the initiative to get soccer started, and Weldon was a key part of this.  We practiced at the baseball diamond at South Cache Junior High School.  This was my first introduction to soccer, other than seeing it on t.v.  It was just before I left on my mission.

November 26, 1976: First Year for Bridgerland Youth Soccer
The American Youth Soccer Organization has been introduced to Cache County.
Peter Banks has headed the Bridgerland Youth Soccer, region 131 of the AYSO.  This has been its first year in Cache County.  225 boys and girls played soccer this year.
Teams practiced at least once a week with games on Saturday at Logan Jr. High.  AYSO's motto is "Everybody Plays".
Hyrum based teams did well and earned first place honors in each of three divisions.  In division I (eight and nine year olds) the Hyrum team Sharks took first.  Playing for the Sharks were: Steve Banks, Kamran Preece, Truman Preece, David Bailey, David Wengreen, Mark Wengreen, Craig Jorgensen, Ryan Brown, Burke Reeder, Joey Maloey, Kurt Johnson and Robi Shelley.  Coaches were Weldon Wardle and Leland Preece.
The Eagles, another Hyrum based team, took first in division II (ten to twelve year olds).  Members of that team were: Mike Banks, Alex Bell, Randy Funk, Kenneth Gordon, Tim Harrison, Bret Johnson, Chris Johnson, Kenny Johnson, Scot Jorgensen, Jeff Loosli, David Preece, Ryan Reeder, Craig Whitaker, Todd Windlow and Rick Wood.  Coaches were Peter Banks and Tor Wedde.
Division III (13 and 14 year olds) saw the Dynamos, a Hyrum, Providence and Nibley team, take first.  Players were: Doug White, Corey Smith, Leonard Barton, Chris Checketts, Todd Larsen, Cory Shaffer, Eric Bell, Dewilton Binggeli, Aleck Johnson, Kenneth Campbell, Scot Johnson, Thor Dyson, Robert Johnson, Kevin Banks, Mario Wilson and Dwane Hansen.  Their coach was Larry Sanchez.

Kim Chang

Kim Chang, his father and younger brother

                 

Kim Chang was on the soccer team I coached after coming home from my mission.  It was a time when soccer was new, and I was coaching 12 year olds.  We had a fast stopper in the back (Mark Wengreen) and with him a couple kids who could kick the ball a long ways; (one was Steve DeHeck) but the focus of the team was Kim Chang.  We wanted to get the ball to him, and let him do his magic. 

He could score and distribute and create better than anyone else on our team, or in our league for that matter.  We road his shoulders to many victories, and he did some incredible things with the soccer ball—at least for us who had never seen such play.  I know he had several games with multiple goals, and three in one game.

I didn’t know how to coach any way but offensive.  I would put most of our players forward, and we would control the ball most of the game.  It was just a matter of time until we scored, and keeping the ball at our end, the other teams had few chances except for an occasional counter attack.

The only time we had a rough game, playing one of the better teams, they put somebody on Chang the entire game, with the idea of pushing him and playing rough with him so as to knock him off of his game.  It worked, and that game we lost 1-0.  It was a rough game because the opposition scored their only goal on an indirect free kick that went directly into the net untouched.  In those days all the refs were new and inexperienced (as well as the players) and there was no way to get it corrected.

But the Chang family was something more to our community.  I grew up in a small rural Utah town, where everyone was white.  As I was growing up, a minority in our town was someone who wasn’t Mormon.  I think we had a couple of Catholic families, and sometimes people who were affiliated with the university would spill over into town with different religions.  There were also a few people of Mexican decent who worked in the agricultural industry, but not many.  The Chang family represented the first family from Korea to live in Hyrum.

At the time, I did some writing for newspapers, and I wrote an article about this family, and their culture.  I was thrilled with the different types of food they ate, and how they were adjusting to a new lifestyle, and their experiences that landed them in rural Utah.  Kim Chang’s younger brother (who also played soccer and often practiced with us) was also named Kim Chang.  I couldn’t understand that.  But I imagine it was hard adjusting to a new culture.

But Chang always seemed happy, popular and content with life.  But being the first at anything can be hard.

I moved on with my life, and so did Chang.  I guess he had some problems becoming an adult.  I don’t know if the stress of being from a different culture, or just the beginning of a mental illness had anything to do with it, but the way I understood the story, is that he was becoming paranoid and delusional.  He was arrested for being in someone’s house.  I think he had been hiding in the closet.  He had become parnoid.  It wasn’t his first arrest.

While he was in jail, he hung himself with a sheet and died.

I loved to see him playing soccer.  I will always remember him on the soccer field.