Mercer University Women’s Soccer – Coach Tony Economopoulos
On today’s episode, I speak with Coach Tony from the Mercer Women’s Program in Georgia. We talk about his recruiting timelines with the 2025s and the new NCAA regulations. He describes the diverse city and the benefits of it being a private institution. Lastly, we discuss how they like to play a possession style with a purpose when on the attack. Learn more about Mercer university Women’s Soccer.
Matt: [00:00:00] Hi everybody. Welcome to discover college soccer today. I’m lucky enough to be joined by coach Tony from Mercer University. Welcome coach.
Coach: Thank you, Matt. Thanks for having me. I’m excited.
Matt: Yeah. Excited to talk to you. I also, I got, I got to flex it. Cause you said I got it right, but coach Economop, Economopoulos, there it is, Economopoulos.
All right. All right. I’m getting better with my Greek, right? Uh, but happy to have you. We’re talking here end of August. You guys, uh, have, have come out just, uh, firing on all cylinders to start the season. So congrats to that. Um, and you know, It’s since you’re, you know, you’re four games in, you got stuff coming up.
So my question, I always ask coaches, how much of your time over the next, say, And we’ll call it 10, 12 weeks, because that’s roughly what you got left. How much of that time during the season is going to be used on recruiting, whether that’s class of 25s or 26s at this point?
Coach: Uh, a lot. I mean, we had a meeting on Monday with my, my two assistants about the recruiting where we’re at, where we feel we’re a little behind still right now.
Um, so we’re every day talking about it. There’s a kid that Whatever happened with her and her power for school. She became available. She reached out to us. We have an ID camp on Monday. We’re sold out. We’re trying to see if we can squeeze her in possibly, but we’re, we’re constantly recruiting. We’re constantly texting kids, emailing kids.
They’re doing with [00:01:30] us. Um, we look at the schedule on Monday of what you see now, what games, what games we can make in the next month to 6 weeks to still see things. So we’re, we’re trying to balance out the season and the success we’ll have. Hopefully, Matt, along with. Recruiting, which never ends until December 15th through the January five window, but we’re always, we’re always talking about it, watching video, replying to emails, and just trying to stay ahead and keep up with everybody else.
Matt: So what would you say is your rough timeline for when You’re going to say, hey, we’re probably done with the 25.
Coach: I would venture to say, possibly around the holiday time, the Christmas, New Year time with this whole roster cap with the power force are talking and that’s going to happen next fall. Um, but we’re also not holding our breath.
You know, we’re not, we’re not going to wait and see what does Georgia do? What does Alabama do? If we, we’ve had historical success of having kids for 4 years and developing them over time. Um, So, right now, we’re at 4 kids in our 25 class. We’re trying to add 2 more kids. We’re actively recruiting kids. If the next 2 months, something happens where a kid that’s a 25 commitment, um, does gets dropped by the power forward that we knew of.
That might change something, but we’re not going to chase these random kids up. Hey, coach, you’re 10 and 2. We’re interested in your school. I got dropped by this ACC school and I haven’t seen her. I don’t have the time or resources or financial capability to go watch this kid last minute. So, we’re going to [00:03:00] stick true to our kids.
We know and recruit that if we get lucky and happen to find a kid that happens to be there, it might be a situation where we’re trying to figure out a financial package that might work for them. But. I’m not going to 25 class. So I hope by December, January, we’re down to 25 and we’re hopefully in the middle to early stages of our 26 is still,
Matt: okay.
Well, you mentioned, obviously there’s still all this up in the air with the NCAA and roster caps and things of that nature, you’re, you’re not power force. So that 28. Cap may or may not apply to you based on how things continue in school and conference decisions. Um, but what is your, is there a roster size that you like to be at or, or will that change at all?
Or what, what do you, what, give me some ideas around your roster side. Yeah. So
Coach: I, I’ve never had a roster bigger than 28 in my 13 years here at Mercer. Um, I think it’s a lot to manage. I think it’s hard to keep kids happy. I think here at Mercer, we’ve done a pretty good job over the course of the last 12 years of trying to give kids minutes when we can’t early non conference season.
Um, I can’t fathom having 4 or 5 more kids trying to find minutes for it. Um, I know the rumor of smaller schools in our conference like this. So, connoisseur schools is. Being private is it’ll be hard to limit roster sizes for sports like football and lacrosse is baseball that brings some money into the school from kids who are walking on, let’s say, are low money kids.[00:04:30]
So I don’t think it’s going to impact me. I’ll have the ability to get more than 28 kids. I’ve never had that many that so it’ll be a challenge for me. Um, my best, my best years were my first 2 when I had 18 and 21 kids and everybody got to travel. Everyone got to play. Um, now, now we’re sitting at 25 kids, but 2 kids are hurt.
So it’s a little bit easier with rotations. But, you know, I’ll take up to 28 Matthew, unless again, something happens where somebody’s like, hey, this kid can really be an impact player. And they fell through the cracks with this power for and so forth. But if not, I’ll look to keep it around the 26 to 28 range.
Matt: Okay, well, you mentioned you’ve got an I. D. camp coming up. How important are those I. D. camps in your overall recruiting process? And do you work? Do you or your staff work other ones as well or just your own? Or what’s that look like
Coach: for school like Mercer and other majors? You know, again, we don’t have the power for financial resources to go to every event and try to watch kids and trainings on a Tuesday night or Wednesday night and watch and play 5, 6 times and all the events.
Um, so for us, it’s important because it gets you here in front of us and from our staff, um, it gets, you know, our campus too. So you kind of see our facilities and Some kids have never seen Mercer or Macon, and it gives them a chance to see, and oh my gosh, this is a beautiful campus, or it’s a horrendous campus.
It’s too small or too big, whatever it might be. But for us, we get to train you for a few hours. We get to see you play in big sided games. Uh, depending on which camp it is, we have some of our girls that jump in and are counselors and help, and we can kind of gauge the level a [00:06:00] little bit on where you’re at with our current roster.
So I think it’s really resourceful for us. Also for kids, you know, who might have an interest in us. Um, and yes, we do work other camps as well. It’s hard in the fall time. Sometimes we’re a season. We found this niche now of Labor Day being a good day for us to do. This is our 2nd, you’re doing it and we’ve sold out.
We grew from last year, but we’ll do it again in January. Our staff will go to Alabama’s or go to Georgia’s in the course of the year. So we try to reciprocate amongst the coaches. We go there, they’ll come here. So I think it’s very important. I mean, I think these can live at more value than some ran some bigger ones.
And I wouldn’t name a, you know, that I’m bringing 30 coaches in. And they have 2, 300 kids. That’s hard for us to identify. Our camp will range between 50 and 75, 80, and we’ll bring more staff if we need to, to get to the 80 kids, um, but we’re keeping more intimate so we can really watch them. So, at this camp here, we’ll have around 64 kids.
All 3 of us will be here. We’re bringing 2 D2 coaches and a D3 coach in. Only 1 of my coaches will be doing a session. The other 2, me and my assistant will be watching. To kind of take notes on kids and so forth. And then in games, we’ll be able to manage with the other two, three coaches and see the kids in live action as well.
Matt: Okay. Well, whether it’s at a camp or, or an event or, or, you know, when you’re looking at players, what is it that kind of draws you to them? What is it that makes you want to offer a player a spot at Mercer, whether both [00:07:30] on the field stuff and off the field stuff?
Coach: Uh, that’s that’s that’s a million dollar question there, man.
It’s a lot of things. Obviously, you know, first look, you see somebody, right? Is there a size and speed? Everybody looks at that. But for a school like Mercer, I think we know the kid that’s 511, 6 foot that runs like Usain Bolt. We’re probably not going to get no matter how bad her touches. So, for us, it’s finding that kid in between that has some pieces, you know, first and foremost is going to be work ethic.
Um, I’m really big with our team here. I always ask him and tell them you’re going to make mistakes in life. You make mistakes in practice and games. It’s how do you react somewhere watching kids at their competitive games when they make a mistake? What’s the reaction? Are they complaining? The official?
Are they just saying we’ll work my tail back to recover when the ball back delay him tackle? Or am I going to complain? You know, that’s a big thing for me because we don’t have the depth and the talent pool. Let’s say that the Florida States might have a power for so I think it’s going to work. Yeah.
During practice and during games. So that’s 1 piece 2 is, you know, do they have something special about them athletically? Do they, you know, maybe she’s a little bit smaller, but she’s more athletic quicker. Maybe she’s taller, but she’s really good in the air, but with small, but a little slower, they got to have 2 or 3 pieces of the puzzle we want, you know, technically or tactically or leadership qualities.
Every kid’s different, so we try to find what we need for that particular class, um, and making sure the work ethic is high, their values as far as being a human being are good, you know, to me, the team chemistry and culture are massive and to bring a [00:09:00] negative person that could be a cancerous cell on your team can disrupt your team isn’t, isn’t something we want to do, no matter how good she is, it’s not worth the headaches from managing a team of 28 young ladies.
So those are important pieces for us. Um, you know, I’d love to kid, the 5 10 athlete tha foot and you know, techni again, we don’t typically they’re going to the larg if you, if you have a dri I think there’s a chance for you at some point, at some school.
Matt: Yeah, absolutely. Well, let’s talk a little bit more about Mercer.
Like I said, I had the chance to drive through Macon, but unfortunately I didn’t get to stop in and see the school. Um, you’ve been there a number of years now. What is it that you really enjoy about Mercer? What are some of the special things about it? Maybe some things we wouldn’t even know by going through the website.
Coach: Yeah, so I’ve been fortunate. I was in the men’s side my 1st 8 years of college coaching, and I last, oh my goodness, how can I, it’s uh, 16 years, 18 years I’ve been on the women’s side now, and I’ve been at Power 5, Power 4, um, I’ve been a mid major, I’ve been a smaller, I’ve been D2, I’ve played NEI, I’ve seen a vast array, I, and when coaching female student athletes, I think the academic piece is very important.
Um, and, and I look at in general terms, like you look at the ACC, it’s probably the best conference top to bottom and soccer wise from how many teams get in the final four should be 16 or when the championships and [00:10:30] academics are a big piece in the ACC SEC is closing the gap some, but that’s what I think hinders SEC is the academic piece.
So, being at Mercer, being an elite school academically, I think it allows us to attract kids who have a higher echelon of academic goals. Two is the support of our administration and from the admin side and athletic side. Our president’s massive, massive, uh, proponent of sports pushes for athletics. He understands it’s the, it’s the doormat to any, any university, the more success you have helps with enrollment, helps with community engagement, helps with donations, having the support of an administration academically and athletic department is massive for me.
Um, so having the, the academic. Regimen we have and the majors we have, we have a medical school on campus. We have a law school. We have engineering school, not many schools. Our size can say to have medical school on campus with a law school and also having education degree. If you want, or if you want communication.
So we have a vast array of majors. We’re very diverse school and city and I think our facilities are great. And we’re in the Southeast. I love the weather. We’re outside. 10 months of the year. The only time we’re inside is because it’s too wet. It rained a little bit in August or in February, but it’s never because of a freeze.
We’re located here at Mercer where we’re three and a half hours from any beach, east coast, gulf, you know, so for me personally, it’s a great location to recruit. And then the biggest thing is the talent pool. And you have in Georgia, you have North Carolina that borders it, you have Florida. So [00:12:00] we’re able to pull a lot of kids and then being private, the cost is the same for kids from Texas, California, or Georgia for us.
So We’re able to recruit nationally as well because being a private institution, there’s no out of state additional costs.
Matt: Yeah, absolutely. In terms of, uh, you know, you mentioned the education component and, and this question pops up every now and again, you mentioned all the medical stuff, but some coaches will tell female soccer players, Hey, nursing and soccer.
Tough to do together or other, other majors. Do you, do you find that to be an issue at Mercer or not so much? How does that all work together?
Coach: Yeah, it is. It can be tough for, for nursing majors, especially we’re pretty transparent. So we have a master’s in nursing program up in Atlanta. And I’ve had my first few years, I think four or five girls who went through, they got biology and a pre nursing track or chemistry, and then went to Atlanta, got the Masters of Nursing, and in a year and a half, additional had a Masters of Science in Nursing Administration, along with a biology undergrad.
So now they could do both admin side and hands on side. It’s just difficult, but other schools where it’s hard to find the rotations they have to line with. in big games. There are a I think, uh, certain part with hospitals and you’re very hard to find that. U major, I’ve read, [00:13:30] it’s pr Because how our season is, it’s 1 season, whereas in basketball, it’s 2 seasons.
You can spread out your hours a little bit in the fall and spring. For us, it’s a little more difficult with that, but we try to be as transparent with kids, you know, say, hey, we don’t have that. I had a kid who wanted to do marine biology and we said, we don’t have that, but she loved the campus. She loved the program.
She ended up going through a, uh, biology, biology degree, then went to J. U. for a master’s of marine biology. So if a kid finders finds the right spot, they might do an undergrad and add on a master’s later on.
Matt: Yeah. Okay. Well, in terms of hours, let’s, let’s fast forward. Say you’re in the heart of that conference season.
Walk me through what a typical week is going to look like for players in terms of when is classes, practices, game cadence, meals, all that kind of stuff.
Coach: So typically Mondays are off day. Um, then Tuesday morning, we’ll train about 7 30, about an hour and a half, about 9. The girls have class from 9 30 until about 3, 4 o’clock.
So they’re done for the day on Tuesdays. Wednesdays. And we’ll do our right now. This show doing Wednesday 8 o’clock. We do our scout for the team. We’re playing on Thursday on what they’re going to look like 8 there. They do a activation lift for 30 minutes with our strength coach kind of activate their bodies.
Great for our session. Then we go off about an hour from 9 to 10. then they have class. At 11 o’clock until 3 or 4 that day, whatever it might be. Thursday is our game day. If we’re at home, we’ll get them out of class around 2 o’clock. They’ll have an hour to kind of go home, decompress, take a nap. We’ll meet at 3 o’clock on that day, [00:15:00] do our scouting report on how we’re going to play against that school.
So, the day before we watch how they do things, the day of, we’ll do what we’re going to do. Then we’ll do a pregame meal together. They got another hour and a half, but to themselves, report back at 545. We go to the field at six o’clock. Um, for seven o’clock game, Friday’s recovery day. So if we’re home, we’ll tend to meet at nine o’clock in the morning.
They will do a recovery left with our strength coach and then we’ll do recovery session. So kids that didn’t play at least 45 minutes on thursday night will play about a 25 minute mini match. The girls that did will be bumpers and jump in and give us more numbers and playing 23 minute rotations. And then when the girls are done playing, the ones that play the book of minutes will roll out.
The girls that did more bumpers or neutrals will pick up all the gear, move the goal. So I’m real big on, hey, I play, but I have to do work still. Just so the kids aren’t playing. Feel like, oh, I got to pick up the gear now as well. I’m really big on it. We’re a team collective unit and they’re all helping out.
So it’s important for me, for the kids who don’t start to realize, hey, I get to play now, but I’m not going to pick up all the stuff afterwards. The starters will. Then Saturday we do a scout again on the opponent light session, finishing set pieces play on Sunday and that’s a repeat of cycle. If that makes sense.
Matt: Yep, absolutely. Well, in. Let’s talk more, I guess, about the, the soccer side. You talk about the, the game canes and whatnot. Um, we talked about your roster size. What about the rest of that roster in terms of staff? [00:16:30] Uh, what role does everybody play? Maybe what other support staff are included in that in the athletic department?
Coach: Yeah, so, you know, we’re not fully funded. We don’t have 3 assistants and ops person, unfortunately. Um, but we do what we do with what we have and that’s part of being at Mercer. We understand that every department at Mercer is probably understaffed from our administration to our athletic training to strength staff.
So, I’m the head coach, I’m an assistant coach full time, then I have a graduate assistant. He or she takes classes along with helping us out. So what happens is, you know, my assistant is pretty much the recruiting coordinator. He or she kind of takes the lead on. Here’s the kids we’re going to look at.
We’re looking at finding new kids. What events we’re going to go to initial contact with recruits. My G. A. He or she then isn’t kind of in charge kind of operations part a little bit of the travel and they’re not calling hotels and bus companies. We’re just giving information out, getting information back and picking we’re going to do getting mills oversees a student manager who helps us with our gear and travel and washing stuff.
Um, but all 3 are kind of soccer mind. So we all work together, collaborate on sessions. Um, you know, and then the wants to be more involved. So I’m gonna let him do more recruiting with us when it’s a close enough trip to go out and network for himself as well. So, the 3 of us try to do the job of like, 5 people at a power 4 with operations and their staff member.
We have a suit manager. He helps us out tremendously except picking up food during preseason for pregame meals. Gets the girls uniforms out packs her bags for him. We have an 80, which helps us athletic trainer, which is great because she takes care of the girls getting healthy and recovery. [00:18:00] If a strength coach, who’s been with us now for 2 years, he’s a grad student, then we have academic support.
We have a person that our girls meet with weekly academically to go over their classes all freshmen meet with him or her once a week. Then if you’re below a certain GPA, you meet once a week. Otherwise it’s bi monthly. Um, and they do a good job of, you know, tracking them, getting in tutors, writing labs, whatever it is.
Um, and we have facilities, people who help us out, you know, we don’t have to paint the field fortunately or mow it, which is nice. Um, so, you know, I feel we’re in a good spot. Always you want more no matter where you’re at, obviously, but, um, we may do what we have.
Matt: All right. Well, what about you coach? Uh, talk to us about your coaching style, style of play you look to play there.
Coach: You know, coming from the men’s side, the women’s side, I think it makes me more of a unicorn. I’d say I’m not your traditional Kumbaya. Everything is roses and dandelion. I’m just not that way. I don’t give simple praise when it shouldn’t be warranted. I tell the girls work ethic and work is part of the gig.
I’m never going to say good work when you’re supposed to work. I’m not going to say good say when it’s a routine collapse knife, you pull one up an upper 90 out. I’m but again, if I, if I don’t. I don’t want to dish out too many compliments when they can’t push themselves. I tell them all the time, I’m not going to give you the compliment until we reach our goal.
You know, I’m going to keep pushing you. Yes, today was good, but could be better. You know, sometimes we’re ultra critical. In games, you know, my job is to manage [00:19:30] the match, the personalities, how we’re doing, as to find deficiencies in the opponent as the game goes on and make tactical adjustments. And that’s my favorite part of the game, of the job, is a game day.
Um, if I could retire 1 day, just could be a game day manager and come in and do the X’s and O’s and move people around adjustments. I would love it. Um, that part never happened, but that’s my favorite piece that recruiting is a 2nd piece. But I love that component of the scouting reports and how we talk about it, how we’re going to break teams down.
Um. And now we’ve added this little room on our press box where we go in and we have a dry erase board and we have a TV and we kind of, we tag, we tag on speedo lives. When we go inside, we try to watch 2 or 3 clips of things are going well, what we got to work on, draw on the board and go back out for a second half and make with our adjustments.
But I’m a coach. That’s very big on possessed with a purpose. and speed of play. I want to play quick. We’re not a direct team. We don’t smash it up top and our girls were onto it. Do we try to find our forwards as fast as possible? Yeah, but usually to their feet, you know, and it’s predicated on what the defender’s doing.
If they’re playing a high line, of course, we’re going behind. Everybody’s going to do that. Whether you’re Barcelona, Man City, or you’re Liverpool, you’re going to go behind. Um, again, if not, we’re going to play underneath, but I want to play with a purpose where let’s not swing the ball left and right 67 times because at some point I’ve done this long enough.
Men and women in the U. S. College soccer are going to make a mistake because you’re going to become impatient. They’re gonna have a bad touch, overhead it, under hit it, and then we’re gonna get countered in our defensive third. So I’m like [00:21:00] 23 passes, break the line, find the mid, find the forward, get numbers forward with speed and create chances.
And we try to tell him the stats map how many goals were scored in three passes or less. You know, it’s not. Yeah, Barcelona is different in main city, but everybody else It’s transition. It’s counter. Get it. Go find them. And so we do that a lot in training and it works for us. We have some athletic pieces for our level.
I feel really good that we’re good on the counter and quick and just we went somewhere. We repress and let’s go. And that’s my mindset and practice and games. The great thing in practice. We can stop it, talk to him, bring it in, redo it, rewind it in games. Now it’s a little more tricky because now you can’t stop it and do whatever you want to do.
That’s where the video comes in play when they come off or have time to show them the adjustments.
Matt: Awesome. Well, coach, really appreciate all the insight you’ve given us. Uh, I want to ask you one last question, and that is for anybody that’s going through this college soccer recruiting process and journey, if you had one piece of advice for them or one nugget of information you would want them to know, what would that be?
Coach: It’s a good one piece. Um, it’s, it’s about you and your time. You know, whenever you, there shouldn’t be pressures. I want to try and eliminate exterior pressures, whether it’s mom and dad, club coaches, friends, other colleges press pressuring you to come to school. It’s your process. And you need to take the time when it’s right for you.
Um, everyone says it’s your journey. That’s true. But, you [00:22:30] know, I always tell kids, you know, some people will put pressure on you to make a decision, but not so because if they want you bad enough, they’ll wait for you next week or 2. If they think highly of you, if not, if they give you a 5 percent scholarship point, maybe they won’t wait for you.
Maybe they will. Don’t feel pressured that Susie has committed. I haven’t yet. You know, don’t don’t don’t be pressured that 2 thirds of your team have committed, but you haven’t yet because you’ll find the right spot because we’re still looking at 25. I mean, we’re going into Christmas break in a few months, still looking for 1 or 225.
So, you If you’re patient and do what’s best for you, hopefully you find a place that’s right for you.
Matt: Absolutely. Well, coach, I really appreciate the time and, uh, wish you the best of luck as the season rolls on and hopefully you’ll be, you’ll be hanging that SoCon banner.
Coach: Matt, I appreciate it and hope you’re right.
And if I do, I’ll be back on the podcast with you again.
Matt: Sounds great. Take care, coach. Thank you.
