He’s familiar with most, if not all, of the players from scouting or coaching against them in high school soccer, but Jon Luce said he’s never had to manage this much talent on one roster.
The Allegany-Limestone boys soccer coach, Luce will coach the New York sideline with assistants Steve DeGroff (Salamanca/Cattaraugus-Little Valley), Matt Finn (Ellicottville) and Nick Perillo (Cuba-Rushford) at Saturday night’s inaugural NY/PA Corporate Cup Soccer Showcase at St. Bonaventure (7 o’clock).
Luce stepped up from an assistant role when Randolph coach Dave Levandowski, previously announced as head coach, backed out due to a prior commitment for Saturday. But Levandowski has stuck around to help the team’s weekly practices.
“IT REALLY hasn’t changed too much,” Luce said of the change in his title, “because we took the approach that even though we all have titles of head coach and assistant coaches, we’re all working at this together for a common purpose. It’s really been a team effort with all the coaches that we have, the five of us. Each of us have a different skillset to bring depending on position or strategy.
“The same thing we want the kids to do, to collaborate and come together and communicate to get the best out of them, we want to do the same thing as coaches.”
Luce’s squad of 22 players includes some of the top Big 30 talent on this side of the state border, including players from Allegany-Limestone, Cuba-Rushford, Ellicottville, Franklinville, Hinsdale, Olean, Portville, Randolph and Salamanca/Cattaraugus-Little Valley.
After coaching against many of them, Luce appreciates getting to “see a different side of the player.”
“Usually you’re going to scout a game or preparing to play against one of these players,” he said, “you look at just their athletic ability on the field, how do they work with their teammates, how are they going to react to different situations in a game. Now, having those players on our team and working with them in practice, I see that as well but now I get to see more of the whole player because I can speak with them individually or see how they react to different situations we may put them in in practice.”
Sharing time in net will be Allegany-Limestone’s Conner Golley and Randolph’s Jarrett Lecceadone.
At forward are Matt Weimer (Portville), TJ Magro (Olean), Marcus Evans (Randolph), Justin Pincoski (Salamanca/Cattaraugus-Little Valley) and Spencer Sklar (Hinsdale).
Dylan Talbot (A-L), Camren Larabee (Cuba-Rushford), Stone Lisek (Portville), Brandon Morrow (Portville), Daniel Taapken (Salamanca/C-LV), Dylan Burton (Franklinville), Zack Linderman (Olean), Robert Spell (Ellicottville) and Delain Geist (Salamanca/C-LV) comprise the midfielders.
Playing defense will be Kellen Martin (Salamanca/C-LV), JT Magro (Olean), Zachary Hemphill (A-L), Seth Farrand (Franklinville), Eli Hendrix (Olean) and Caden Larabee (C-R).
Luce said he’ll be substituting to give all 22 players a “decent” if not equal amount of playing time.
“The difference is (from a regular season game) when we’re subbing players out, we’re really not losing any talent on the field, we’re just replacing it with another great player that we have available to us,” Luce said. “I’m looking for the game to be high-intensity. I know both groups of teams are excited to be the first ones that are going to showcase our skill level from this area.
“We’ve been talking with our team about keeping possession and not just go, go, go. We want to keep possession and show our real soccer ability.”
Luce said he wanted to thank Kris Linderman and Dave Talbot of the Olean Soccer Club “for the work they put in to make this game happen.”
The first game of its kind in the area, featuring seniors and underclassmen alike after the high school season, was attractive to Luce and his team for several reasons. The Gators had missed out on other opportunities to play a senior game in recent years as their playoff runs reached the Far West Regionals.
“The bad thing is some of the kids from certain teams don’t get an opportunity to show their skills to maybe a college coach that’s going to come watch that game,” Luce said. “So I think it’s really good that these kids get the opportunity to showcase their skills in front of, I’m hoping to be a big crowd but it’s also going to have coaches that they may be able to play for in the future at the next level.”
