With a new coach and new team name, the women’s soccer team looks to start the season off strong at STLCC-Meramec.
By: Spencer Gleason
– Sports Editor –
With new team colors and a new name for athletics being shared across STLCC campuses, the 2011-2012 athletic campaign for the STLCC Archers will be highlighted by a season of firsts. Feats that may have been accomplished by a Magic, Fury or Highlander player before have yet to be achieved by an Archer.
While the men’s soccer team will play at STLCC-Florissant Valley, the lady Archers soccer team will call Meramec home.
“I think it’s pretty exciting. We got pretty good numbers,” the Archers’ new head coach, Juergen Huettner, said, after the team’s first practice. “We did a pretty good job recruiting… It looks pretty promising. We got some nice talent out there.”
Huettner has spent the past two seasons coaching women’s soccer at STLCC-Forest Park. While coaching the now defunct Highlanders in 2009, Huettner led his team to the most wins ever in its program’s history—10. Along with reaching the Regions XVI championship, Huettner was awarded the Regions XVI Coach of the Year award.
Last season, the Highlanders reached double digits in the victory column again and eliminated the Meramec Magic in the Regions XVI Tournament.
“I still continuously slip and talk about the Highlanders and STLCC-Forest Park,” Huettner said. “It’s a habit after coaching there a couple years. You get used to saying that. [Saying] ‘the Archers’ is something new. I try to side-step it a little bit and just usually refer to us as St. Louis Community College. It makes it a little bit easier.”
Mixing in some of his home-grown talent from STLCC-Forest Park, Huettner has brought with him a winning make-up to add, along with the returning Meramec players and new recruits.
“We have five kids moving from STLCC-Forest Park to the Archers,” Huettner said. “We have three kids from Meramec, joining us from [the Magic] to the Archers. The rest of them are recruits. Right now, almost 60 percent of the team really doesn’t have any association with anything different than the Archers… So, it’s a good mix. I think all the girls worry about is playing on a competitive team.”
Jessica Schlichtig, who played for the Meramec Magic last season, was named to the Second Team All-Midwest Community College Athletic Conference (MCCAC) and to the Magic All-Sportsmanship Team.
“I think we’re working pretty good together,” Schlichtig said after practice. “We have good chemistry coming from two different teams. We were really kind of worried about it, but it’s really gone well for us.”
One of those new players from rival school STLCC-Forest Park, is Allison Ring. Ring was also named to the Second Team All-Conference after last season. “It’s a transition for [STLCC-Forest Park players] at least because we used to play on turf,” Ring said. “So now we have to deal with the bouncing, but I like it a lot better. It’s nice having your own field and not having to share with a high school.”
The women’s soccer team will help kick off the new season on Aug. 22, when they face the Fontbonne Griffins for their first exhibition game. The Archers will start the regular season at home on Friday, Aug. 26 at 5 p.m., against the Red Devils from the Kansas campus of Allen County Community College.
The Archers will play 20 games during the regular season. Eight of those games will be played on the Archers home turf. While six of them will be played on the Meramec campus, the other two ‘home’ games, on Sept. 13 and Oct. 16, will be played at STLCC-Florissant Valley as part of a doubleheader that will include the men’s soccer team as well.
With the entire season in front of his Archers, Huettner and his coaching staff has begun the long journey that lies ahead. They look to continue the winning tradition that Meramec soccer had for many years and combine that with the winning style Huettner had while at STLCC-Forest Park. Only this time around the soccer field is slightly different. This year, they’ll be sporting the colors of navy blue and silver.
“One thing that we definitely want to do,” Huettner said. “We’re going to want to field right from the get-go a competitive team and have a winning attitude … We’ll play a winning style [of soccer].”
