Trinity Valley Community College Women’s Soccer – Coach Jim Elder

On today’s episode, I speak with Coach Elder from the Trinity Valley Women’s Program in Texas. We talk about how they focus on recruiting Texas and Internationally. He describes how the school has committed both money and resources to building a winning program. Lastly, we discuss the supportive staff throughout the school and athletic department. Learn more about Trinity Valley Community College Women’s Soccer.

Matt: [00:00:00] Hi, everybody. Welcome to discover college soccer today. I’m lucky enough to be joined by coach elder out at Trinity Valley community college. Welcome coach. Thank you, Matt. Glad to be here. Yeah. Thanks for being on. You are the, the women’s coach, your two year program down in Texas. And, uh, unfortunately your season just wrapped up, uh, from what I can see.

Um, so what’s it like at a junior college? You’re wrapping up the season in terms of, you know, I mean, this week is Fun because the transfer portal opened as well on the women’s side. So things are a little bit nuts, but how much are you focused on helping your, your graduating players find a new home versus recruiting new ones in what’s that looking like for you right now?

Coach: It’s all, it’s all the above. Um, I started the recruiting the day we lost or the day our season finished, we started recruiting and traveled to Canada already. I’m going to Europe next week. Um, so I’m active, my assistant coach is active recruiting the same time. We don’t have a lot of sophomores because this was our first recruiting class.

So most of my players are freshmen returning, but the sophomores I do have, I have like. Three or four sophomores. We’ve already had meetings with them to talk about their goals for carrying on their play and their academics at four year schools and we’ll help them. Uh, we’ve already had 1 sign with the college and, uh, because we have, we have a good season and they’re good players.

They’ll, they’ll [00:01:30] move on to 4 year schools. And most of them will get most everything paid for. There’s, there’s some good opportunities. If you’re a good player playing for a good school. Um, depending on what, what you need, uh, academically or. Financially. 

Matt: Yeah, for sure. Well, you mentioned Canada and Europe, but, but where else are you looking, uh, for, for players?

Uh, what, what are the kind of the spots you like to make sure you get to each season? 

Coach: Yeah. The demographics for us that work the best are local Dallas area, Texas area, close to home. Because we’re a two year school, we have a different. type of player we look for. Of course, we look for the elite player. We look, we really look for division two, N.

C. W. Division two level players, sometimes the lower division one players, athletic skilled. We find those throughout Texas. We’re a hotbed down here. We have tons of players make sense. Ones that maybe want to stay close to home to your school makes sense. So we kind of split it up at the same time. Uh, the internationals are Wanting to come over here.

Uh, it’s hard for them to get into the big schools, the cost of the international scholarships, a lot more. Uh, sometimes they need to acclimate themselves for a year or two and play at a high level and that’s kind of our international side of the recruiting. 

Matt: Okay. Now, uh, ID camps have kind of become a, all the rage these days.

So do you guys host your own or do you or your staff work other people’s ID camps? Are they part of your recruiting process at all? 

Coach: Yes, we work other people’s, um, I, I usually have I’ve been doing this for a long time [00:03:00] as you can probably see. Uh, so I send my system to out for those camps. There are some players we can pick up those camps.

We hit the showcases a lot with the high school games with the club games again, because we’re here close to the. The big cities. It’s easy for us to get around and find players and look at players. We hit the recruiting sites. I mean, we do it all the camps for us personally. We haven’t I’ve never had a facility to really set one up.

And before I was a D3 juco, we didn’t have scholarships. So we didn’t do them. But now we’re going to start our own. Um. And we expect to pick up, uh, maybe a golden nugget every now and then out of the 40, 50, 60 kids, we get to an ID clinic and they’re mostly kids from the Texas area that are still looking.

Matt: Okay. Well, you mentioned a little bit before in terms of what you’re looking for from a talent perspective, but overall, kind of what makes up that hierarchy of things you’re looking for in a player, both on the field and off the field. 

Coach: Um, I hear a lot of stuff from a lot of different coaches. Uh, I have my own recipe.

It’s been very successful. Um, we’ve won a bunch of championships. So, uh, I kind of, you know, I’ve been to the school system. I played at very high level. I’ve raised two kids that have been to the school system, the college system. Um, so I have a certain personality as a coach, so I don’t bother so much with off the field issues to start with.

I look for talent and I look for athletic talent and I look for technical talent because [00:04:30] we’re a two year school. We won’t get the blue tip players that are going to end up at Notre Dame or University of Texas. But there’s a lot of next level next tier players that are very good. Um, I will look for that level.

And, uh, after I find the level and we have a hit, uh, we get to know the player, we get to know the family. Um, there’s never really Matt, there’s never been a horse. I haven’t been able to tame. So I, I don’t, I don’t worry too much about, um, what coaches, you know, she’s got a bad attitude, but you know, um, sometimes that’s the program they’re in the system they’re in.

Uh, I just, I really haven’t had a, I haven’t, I haven’t thrown the baby out with the bath water. I usually go with the talent. It’s worked out for me. Uh, sometimes it does require some work on my side, uh, to get them straightened out their attitude. Right. But you know, it’s, it’s, it’s the world we live in and, and nothing, there’s never a perfect 25 man roster.

Matt: Well, and that was actually gonna be my next question. Is that is 25 the roster you’re looking for each season when you’re recruiting? 

Coach: Yeah, we go a little bit above that usually, but 25 is the number because, as most coaches know, you want to have 11 11 on any given day for your tactical scrimmages and for, you know, to practice your your Your regulation match stuff and during the season, you’ll have injuries have nagging injuries.

You’ll have sometimes season ending injury. So 25 padded a little bit. Sometimes we go like this year. We had 29. we have some project players. [00:06:00] Um, but, uh, it gets, it gets, uh, a little, a little tougher as you go above 26, 27 players. 

Matt: Well, let’s talk a little bit more about the school, um, kind of, you’ve been there since January.

Now, what, what kind of drew you to the school? What are some of the things that you found about Trinity Valley that, that stick out that maybe some things we wouldn’t even know by going through the website? 

Coach: Yeah, sure. No, I was at a D3, Duco in Dallas for, for 9 seasons and I had a lot of success there. Um, And, uh, I live, I moved during COVID and I moved a little closer to TVCC, but they’re division one.

That means scholarships, dorms, cafeterias, which, you know, I would have liked, but they just weren’t committed to the program. And in December they turned the things around. They decided that they want to compete as they do in other sports, uh, same in women’s soccer. So they upped the scholarships. Um, they, uh, are rebuilding the facilities, the field.

We’ve And that was I interviewed with them. Um, I’m at a point now where I don’t need to go anywhere. I want to, I want to go somewhere that makes sense. Uh, and, uh, when I, when I went in, they said, we’re, we’re in it to win it. Um, and I asked them all the tough questions about, you know, if you really want to win it, I got to have a top facility and I have to have top dollars and they had everything else.

They had the infrastructure. Structure. They have a huge budget for us operating budget, which is phenomenal for a two year school. [00:07:30] We have great transportation, great athletic training, great resources. They’ve redone the field. We’ve got our own facility, own offices. So it’s really spectacular for a Division one junior college to have these things.

And that’s what sold it to me is number one. It’s closer to my home, but just as importantly is they’re they’re committed to it. And I would love to To take on the challenge. I love the challenges. Anyway, I get bored with with with winning. Uh, you know, you went so much in one spot. It’s not the same. So I just I just love the challenge.

So it was a great challenge for me to take it on and rebuild it. And, uh, that’s that’s why I jumped at it. My enthusiasm, my drilling got flowing and, um, that’s where we are right now. And, uh, that’s why I took the job. 

Matt: Well, for new student athletes to college, sometimes the, it can be a challenge really balancing the demands of, of the academic side with being a collegiate athlete.

So specifically, how do your students really balance the 2, uh, and what kind of support systems maybe does a school offer to help them both on the field and off the field? 

Coach: Yeah, I’m, you know, I, I was born and raised in America. So you got to have a college degree. Uh, the family wants to have a college degree.

Most, most of the girls do. I mean, the girls are good students. And so when we come in, we make it clear that, uh, you’re not here to play soccer. You’re here to study. And if you study and do well, you’ll get to play soccer. So, um, we have, we do grade checks every couple of times a month. We watch them [00:09:00] closely.

We have, because we have international English as a second language, we watch them really closely because we’re, um, where we’re at, uh, we’re in a great city, small city, everyone loves, you know, we are the pro team for the city because there, there, there’s nothing bigger than us. And because of that, the, uh, the support is tremendous for the student athlete, the professors, uh, work with them.

Uh, if they’re struggling, we have, uh, we have a designated tutor that works only with our athletes and their study hall daily. So it’s a great program to help them. Kids get over the hump. We identify the problems early. And, uh, for an example, we had a girl that was failing almost all her classes. Uh, and it was obvious she wasn’t applying herself.

So we, we, we told you she’s got to sit out and get her classes under control. And she did that for three years. 2, 3 weeks and man, her professors were working with her and she’s above passing in all classes now. And now she’s, she’s back in status. So, um, academics is, as we all know, is very important. We love our soccer.

It’s the most important thing for me. But at the same time, you don’t pass your classes. You don’t play soccer. And so, and we have a commitment to the families to the parents. So we, we have great resources. They juggle it really well. There’s plenty of time with scholarships. You don’t have to work. So there’s plenty of time to do your soccer, uh, to do your studies and plenty of time to study in between.

And so it works out really well. We’re a small campus, so it doesn’t take any time to get to the cafeteria or the field or back to the library. And so it [00:10:30] works out really well. And we’ve had really good results so far. 

Matt: Awesome. Well, let’s rewind maybe to the last month, October, heart of the season. Walk me through what does a typical week look like for a player in terms of their schedule?

Like winter classes, meals, practices, game cadence, all that kind of stuff. 

Coach: Yeah, great. Okay. Um, well, unlike high school, kids don’t go to school from 8, 8 to 3 in the afternoon and just, you know, which is, which is beautiful. Nowadays, they have a lot of online classes. They have hybrid classes. You can go to class 1 day online.

The next you can go on class the entire time. So, a typical day would be for them to get up, go to breakfast and then go shoot off to class and they’ll go to class, say, from 8 to 1231 o’clock or, you know. You know, nine to two or nine to one thirty, uh, right after that, they do lunch. Um, and, uh, then they come to training.

We have training at three o’clock. Uh, then we train for an hour and a half, two hours. Um, just about that time, it’s dinner time. They run over to dinner, uh, and then they have the rest of the evening to study. Um, and in our situation, all of our girls are in the same facility. They stay in the same facility.

So they’re taking classes together, studying together at night, and we have tutors in different. Parts of the camp is easy to get to, uh, and then we do that Monday through Friday during the season. We’re playing Tuesdays and Fridays. Um, so they go to class on Tuesday, unless we have a trip and we, we get professors approval to get out on our trips.[00:12:00] 

They’ve got the afternoon to work on their classes. We have our game starting anywhere from 4 to 7 o’clock at night. Most of our games, because we’re a junior college, and we’re regional, everything is within. Two, three hours drive and we have beautiful buses. So it’s efficient to get them there, get them back.

We feed them. Um, and we do that Monday through Friday and then Saturdays and Sundays. We typically will give them off to refresh, get control of their academics, recover a little bit, get ready for the next week. And that’s a typical week for us. 

Matt: Okay, awesome. Well, in terms of you kind of mentioned that the facilities and what you have there So, can you talk to me about and I’m not holding you to hard numbers here But but what would a student athlete that was coming to your program expect in terms of costs for for for attending and you said?

I think there are dorms available because not all Two year programs have that. So what does all that look like? 

Coach: Yeah, it’s, uh, another advantage. And one of the reasons I, I chose TVCC is our, our, uh, full tuition, full, uh, room board books. Everything is for, for us kids, about $12,000 a year. Very, very low. Um, I’ve got a lot of athletic scholarship money.

Most of my kids are getting everything paid for. Some of them qualify for the government FAFSA, Pell Grants. Um, between that and what they [00:13:30] need, uh, I have enough budget money to get everyone covered. And that’s important to me because, um, you know, we’re, we want to have a successful program and when kids come to come to us, we want to, we want to have total commitment and, uh, that means they don’t have to have a job.

Uh, you know, we’re going to take care of them in the, in the, in the business office for the, for the funds. Uh, and, and they, we expect them to. To reciprocate and be serious about their football and their soccer and their academics. And so it makes for a really good, a really good situation for him. We take the stress away from mom and dad and from them.

We also have a school pantry where they can go shop twice a month for snacks and hygiene stuff. And, um, we just have a lot of support for the student athlete and that’s important for us so that they can be the best they can be in the classroom and on the field. 

Matt: No, it sounds great. Well, let’s talk about the team.

I mean, you mentioned you have an assistant coach. I mean, can you just talk to me about what does your staff look like? What role does everybody play? Maybe what other staff staff are in the athletic department that help out with the team as well? 

Coach: Yes, we have, um, an assistant coach and it’s a well paid full time assistant coach.

Um, next year, I will get a full time, uh, scholarship for a young, young coach and or a young manager to come in and, you know, Be a manager for us. Um, and then we have, of course, the athletic director. We have a sports information director. We have video guys. We have guys we [00:15:00] have. We have so much help and so many resources.

All we really need to do from a staff is keep track of the team and season, the training, the management, the uniforms, do the great checks, just kind of manage them on and off the field. But, uh, I’m, I’m blessed with that because a lot of schools don’t have those resources and head coaches doing all the heavy lifting.

And, uh, I’ve, I’ve got a full time really good assistant, uh, so that we can get it all knocked out and, uh, be able to focus on, on what’s most important during the season and in the off season when it comes to recruiting. 

Matt: Yeah, that’s fantastic. Well, let’s, let’s talk about you. How would you describe kind of your style of coaching and the style of play you’re looking to play there?

Coach: Oh, hi, I’m, I’m German descent. So I’ve always loved the quick passing game. Um, I’m a student of the game. Uh, I played at a pretty good level and I have high expectations for my teams and, uh, my style of play is, um, Very, very modern, very sophisticated. You have the modern pressing. I love to have a very organized defense and that starts up top with the strikers.

We all have a role. Uh, we’d spend a lot of time teaching everyone their specific role, given the game and, and the opponent. Um, we, I like to play at a fast pace. I’d love to get the ball back. quickly. Once we get it, we want to hold it. We love the beautiful game. We love possession. We want it. We want to go where it allows us to hold the ball.

There’s benefits in holding the ball, and we like to frustrate the opponent. We like the opponent chasing us a lot, but we [00:16:30] like to also attack when it’s on, and we attack from all spots. Anybody is free to go if it’s on. We educate the players about covering. So we have a very dynamic team that goes out.

at a fast clip. Uh, even though we’re holding possession, we’re doing it with one and two touches. We’re moving the ball very quickly and we work a lot on our shape and our roles in our, you know, if you’re an outside back involved, you see the ball, you’re gonna have these options. Option one winger, option two, number nine, option three, uh, number six and or it’s not on started, you’ll have a player behind you, goalkeeper behind you.

And so it’s a, it’s a fast pace. It’s a quality game. And, uh, we, we try to make it pretty for the fans and exciting for the spectators, um, and play to really, really high modern level. And, and we need the players. Uh, we need the good players to be able to execute that. And that’s why we work so hard in recruiting the right players in.

Matt: Oh, awesome. Well, you’ve been generous with your time coach. I’m gonna leave you with one last question. Uh, and that is if you had one piece of advice for, for any student athletes going through this college recruiting process, uh, right now, what would that be? 

Coach: Well, I, I, I don’t know if I’d have one piece, but some advice would be, um, sometimes you got to play down to, to get more.

If you want more dollars, want more money, you’re going to have to play down. Most people try to play above their level, um, you know, and that’s a mistake. It takes a long time to find a place, uh, make [00:18:00] sure you, you look at yourself in the mirror clearly, make sure your family’s clear about it. Who are you as a player?

Who are you? And go find a school that will match your playing ability. And if you want more money, play down a level, you’ll get more money, more opportunity. 

Matt: That’s true. Very true. Well, coach, I really appreciate the time. Wish you best of luck as you, uh, continue on recruiting and getting those players placed.

And, uh, we wish you best of luck for next season. Thank you so 

Coach: much. Appreciate you, Matt, and good luck in your, in your podcast. 

Matt: Thanks.