Iowa Western Community College Men’s Soccer – Coach Mike Brown
In today’s episode, I speak with Coach Brown from the Iowa Western Men’s Program in Council Bluffs. We talk about how they look at the person before the player when recruiting. Coach also shares how everyone there wants you to be successful. Plus, we discuss how they try to setup players for success after leaving the school. Learn more about Iowa Western Community College Men’s Soccer.
Matt: [00:00:00] Hi everybody. Welcome to Discover College Soccer. Today I am lucky enough to be joined by Coach Mike Brown from Iowa Western. Welcome coach. Welcome. Thank you. Yeah, thank you for being here. Especially, uh, as you know, we’re talking here mid-November and luckily, uh, I’m thinking your season’s still going, huh?
Yep.
Coach: Uh, we just won the district championship the other day. Um, so we’ll be heading out to Florida on Wednesday.
Matt: Awesome. Congratulations. I know that well, the, the, the, the results of that will be all done and dusted by the time this goes live, but, uh, but congrats on that. Um, yeah, I’m looking here. You guys are ranked number two men’s division one junior college program in the country.
Uh, I guess the biggest question mark, I think that I have is, how do you pronounce your mascot?
Coach: Called a rever, um, rever. So it’s actually a, yeah, it’s a rever. Um, it’s a river pirate, so it kind of goes back towards like 18th century, way back in the day from there.
Matt: So. Love it. Love it. Well, [00:01:00] you know, sometimes you, you see these mascots, you’re like, I’m not sure what the, what that is.
So I appreciate the, the pronunciation. Um, but I, I mean, I know it’s tough ’cause you’re still, you know, you’re still fighting in the, in the, in the tournament and your season’s still going so. As a junior college, especially since you gotta replenish that roster twice as much as everybody else. How, how much recruiting is happening during the season?
You know, I mean, what percentage would you say has been on recruiting versus just the, the day to day of the season in, in your,
Coach: um, you know, I think we have a very short window with our guys. Um, and so I try actually not to spend a lot of time in season recruiting. I try to really put a lot of my time individually onto more of the players we have in front of us.
Um, you know, I think with how we recruit, you know, we recruit a lot of kids that are trying to go professional at the moment and school hasn’t worked out for, and so we usually, our recruiting ramps up anywhere from. [00:02:00] Probably I would say, uh, December to even June, July. Um, you know, it’s a pretty extensive, you know, I would say from that then.
Matt: Yeah, no, that makes sense. Especially, I mean, when you look at your roster, you, you have a, I’d say a, a pretty healthy international, uh, flavor in there. And I know those tend to recruit later in the, in the calendar year. Right.
Coach: We do. But I mean, I will tell you like, I like recruiting kids from the United States.
Um, you know, I think if you were to look at our roster comparison to the most, um, junior college rosters, we probably have a lot more kids from the United States. Um, you know, in fact, I mean, we’ve got two local products probably in our starting lineup right now. Um, you know, I, I think for us it’s more about finding elite people.
It doesn’t really matter where they come from. We just wanna find, find the right people.
Matt: Ah, that’s, that’s great. So when it comes to recruiting domestically, where are you finding those kids? What events are you going to, how, how does that work for you guys? [00:03:00]
Coach: Um, this year we actually found some guys from the MLS Next Pro, um, you know, just our contacts with MLS clubs that we have.
We’ve been very fortunate in the past few years where we’ve had a few guys drafted and I think through that a lot of the MLS clubs have started to develop a greater respect for us, um, and just our pathway and what it presents. And so with that, we’ve done that. Some of the MLS next events, um, we try to do a lot of local ECNL events.
We, um, from there, um, and then we use our camps. Our camps are a big thing, especially for anyone local. We really won’t recruit. Any local kids, unless we can have ’em at our camps and work with them and really spend a lot of time with them, um, we try to keep our, like, I mean our camps only costs $50. Um, for like the ID camps, we try to keep it very cheap just so we can make sure we’re getting like, we don’t want anyone to be financially, you know, burdened from that.
From there.
Matt: Oh, that’s great. Well, whether it’s through [00:04:00] ECNL or an MLS next pro event or your, or your camps kinda what makes up that hierarchy of things you’re looking for in a player both on and off the field?
Coach: Um, I, I think for us, really it comes down to is like we’ve really over the last two years zeroed in on the person even more.
Um, and really just got into finding the right type of characteristics. People that we think fit what we’re looking for, you know? And then from there we try to zero out. Okay, are they good enough? Um, you know, but we’ve, I think sometimes when you look at the talent first, you know, in terms of like what a player can do on the field.
You might fool yourself, um, in terms of their character a little bit as a coach. And so we try to look at the character first and like, you know, we want guys that are elite competitors. We want guys that are tough, gritty, just kind of that, um, you know, guys that are adaptable, you know, they have intelligence, you know, socially on the field, things like that.[00:05:00]
Um, and then we want leaders. You know, it’s a big thing for us. We look for a lot of guys who are captains and leaders of their teams and things like that. ’cause that usually represents a high end character type guy From there doesn’t mean always, but you know, I mean, I think for us, like we try to find those type of people ’cause they seem to do well in the type of type of environment we’ve created here.
Matt: Okay. That makes sense. Well, one of, one of the things, you know, with the junior college system is, is a lot of guys are, are focused on, you know, where they go next. Um, talk to me about how, how you’ve, you guys have been successful in, in moving on the players that, that want to, to play at the next level, whether that’s college or pro.
Coach: I, that’s our first job is to move guys on. And so I try to make that clear to every guy when they come in here. Um, you know, my first job is to move ’em on, but my primary job really in the end is to make sure they’re successful once they leave us. So I think, um, you know, whether that is in six [00:06:00] months or whether that is in a year or that is in 18 months or two years, or, you know, we even have some guys that registered their first year and they’re finishing their third year here.
Um, it’s whatever is best for that individual and everyone has their own journey. Um, you know, Roman Tores came here for a year. Went to Crane for a semester and he was drafted. Um, you know, Moise was here for two years and he draft, like it’s all variety from there. Um, it’s, it’s about what’s best for that individual.
Um, and I think, you know, luckily I coached in division one for a few years, um, and so like I’ve seen both sides of the table and I think a lot of schools have a lot of respect for what we’re trying to play here. Um, what we’re trying to do here and we play. In the spring and um, fall preseason, we’ll play a lot.
Division ones, we go and play MLSX PRO teams. Um, so our guys are constantly being exposed to that level and being pushed to those type of heights. And, you know, I think for me that’s something that’s really important. I think it [00:07:00] gives four year schools and professional coaches ability to see where our guys stack against that level from there.
And I think that helps in the recruitment process.
Matt: Okay. Well, one of the. A lot of times a reason. Someone chooses a two year school is, is for the financial aspect. It can save ’em a lot of money. Um, I’m not, I’m not holding you to hard numbers here, but can you just walk me through what a, what a prospect coming to Iowa Western might be looking at in terms of what the cost is and what the housing situation is there, et cetera?
Coach: So room, books, meals, um, tuition, everything. You’re looking around 12 to 13 k. Um, you know, and that’s unlimited meals, everything. It’s a really, um, very, I wish I knew about this type of situation when I was coming out. Um, you know, I went to an NAII went thousands of dollars in debt. I’m still paying to this day.
Um, you know, I think for what we have in terms of facilities, structure, set up, environment, all those things, I think we definitely [00:08:00] get, you get the biggest bang for your buck, I would say.
Matt: Yeah.
Coach: Yeah,
Matt: for sure. Well, let’s, let’s talk a little bit more about the school. Um, you know, you’ve been there a few years, kinda what have you found that’s awesome about the schools?
What stands out? Maybe some things we wouldn’t even know by going through the website.
Coach: You know, every, everyone wants you to be successful here. And it’s, I remember in 2023 we had a down year. Um, you know, we were six, four and four. We finished ninth in the country, which is a great year for a lot of programs.
And I felt. You know, everyone around me was winning a national championship or something and we felt kind of left out of the party, but it was just kind of cool. ’cause you know, there was a lot of support though. Like, hey, you know, it’s a down year, but we, we know you guys, we know how you do things. Um, you know, and you could just see a lot of our sport.
And then next year, last year we won the national championship. Um, you know, I think for me, um, you know, it’s just a special place. It, it’s a very unique place. Um. And [00:09:00] I think it’s a place that I don’t know if I could ever see myself leaving because you can have success and there’s great people here and there’s a purpose you where you can make a, you know, just a impact on kids’ lives that’s much different than you would maybe at four year school.
Um, and then, you know, I think for me, just the location too, like it’s. We get the best of both worlds. We’re right in right outside Omaha about 10 minutes away, but we’re also a little bit disconnected. So you get kind of that small town, big city feel. Um, and so, which I think is great in regards to that.
Matt: Oh, that’s great. Well, you know, with kids coming internationally, kids coming from all over the country to, to play for you, um, you know, ’cause. Balancing the demands of, of a high level soccer program, plus going to school can, can be tough. Kind of what support systems are in place there to help students be successful both on and off the field.
Coach: So I mean, a few things. Um, I think our [00:10:00] structure, you know, we try to structure our day-to-day, our environment. Um, very much I would say like a. Elite Environment, elite Academy, um, professional team. And so, you know, our guys, they have breakfast club every morning at 8:00 AM so, you know, I, I think that’s a big barrier for a lot of kids just when they’re in college, just getting outta bed, you know, and just getting the class and doing those things.
So we’ve got Breakfast Club and then, um, right after that they’ll have a team meeting, then they’ll have weights. And then, um, you know, then you have training and then you go to classes. So you’re already up moving for the day and going on there. So if you’re not going to class, you’re making that choice on your own and there’s a problem there.
Um, you know, tutoring is free. Um, I think, you know, the student, the teacher ratio is about like 12 to one, you know, or something like that. So, I mean, it’s, you’re, you’re not really in a class with 500 people or anything like that. Like the classes are fairly small. [00:11:00] Your teachers know you. Um, you know, we have a high standards in terms of academically, we do grade checks every two weeks.
Um, if you get one grade below C like you’re not playing, and I don’t care if you’re the best player in the world or not, like. We try to really recruit a team where there’s three to four great players at every position. So you’re constantly held accountable in that way because of that. Um, I think, um, you know, another thing is just.
I think we care, you know, we legit care about these guys. Um, my wife, she does, um, volunteers, does academic planning for guys that we feel could be at risk in their first year. Just helping kind of, and it’s not like tutoring, it’s more like just planning and, and giving them like a planner and helping them kind of plan out their week.
And was Simon say they need to do with imbalance of soccer and all that? And then we’ve got curfew every night at 10:00 PM Um, you know, so I mean, we keep a pretty regimented structure in terms of what they’re doing with their day. Um, where I think, you know, some guys when they leave here, they’re like, oh, sweet freedom.
But I [00:12:00] know from talking to a lot of them, they find themselves wanting to come back to these type of habits because of how they felt about themselves and how they felt about their day. So, yeah.
Matt: Great. Well, I mean, you, you kind of talked about it a little bit, but, you know, take it, take us back, uh, maybe a couple weeks, you know, you’re finishing up the, the regular season.
Kinda what does a typical week look like in terms of schedule with game cadence and, and all those things besides what, you know, I know you just told us a little bit. Yeah. It’s kind
Coach: of hard now, I would say with us. Um, ’cause we don’t, we have a conference that consists of two teams. Oh, okay. And so. We take whatever games we can get.
And so sometimes our game schedule is all over the place and we try to schedule a toughest schedule we can every year because we want to, um, really challenge our guys and prepare them for the next level. Um, you know, so like the week can vary. We try to keep the days pretty regimented and structured, but like, you know, if you have a game, you know.
It could be on [00:13:00] the road. You know, with Chico, we don’t really have the budget to go the night before. And so, and even a place like us, we try to, you know, preserve our funds and use our funds in other areas. And I think with that, what we see is like we’ll be traveling the day of. And so that’s a bit of adjustment for some guys sometimes.
But, you know, I think most part, like your day’s gonna normally look, that just the week will depend on what games you have and things and how it fits within the schedule from there.
Matt: Okay. Well, let’s talk a little bit more about the team. Um, I, is there, is there a roster size that you find is ideal that you’re trying to hit each year?
Coach: Um, we have, we have two kind of teams that operate under the umbrella of our program. We have our first team and then we have our gap year program. Um, you know, our gap year program we use strictly is kind of like a developmental program. We don’t like having those guys play JD games. Just to lose a year of eligibility.
Um, you know, a lot of schools are very enrollment driven and, um, we choose not to do that. We [00:14:00] try to use it as more of a developmental thing in that regard. Um, you know, and then we have our first team, and so each team probably consists of about 38 to 40 players at a time. Um, you know, that number will vary based off.
Academic suspensions, injuries and things like that, um, from there. But, you know, we try to keep the numbers high to help players be held accountable from there.
Matt: Okay. Well what about the rest of the roster, the staff? How many folks do you have on staff? Who, what are some, so what roles do they play? Yeah,
Coach: yeah.
So I have my associate head coach, um, Cesar her, he used to be assistant Division one. Um, he chose to come back here. Um, he was the assistant here for a little bit. Um, you know, we had an opportunity with one of my other assistants, took a D one job to kind of create a position for him, um, that I think was really good for him and his family.
Uh, then we have two other assistants. Um, you know, Robert Hernandez, he’s a former player of mine. Um, he, he lives in the dorms and then our assistant, Anthony Delina that lives, [00:15:00] um, in the dorms as well. And then we have a goalkeeper coach, and then we have a, another, uh, sports performance guy that, um, you know, he focuses, he’s not like, you know, most schools I think you have like a weights coach or the head coach does the weights.
Things like that. And if that weights coach sometimes plays football or baseball or something like that, we’ve got an actual soccer guy. So that really, I think for us, separates us. He does a lot of things that they’re doing at professional level. He helps with recovery, rehab. Um, you know, this year we’ve been hit by the injury bug a little bit, but the thing about him is he’s really great at like reducing the entry time and getting guys back in return to play in the right time for them.
Matt: Okay. Well, what about you? Talk to us about your coaching style and, and the style of play you’d like to play there.
Coach: Um, you know, I think for me it all revolves around I want my guys to be successful, um, when they leave us. Like that’s the most important thing. And so everything and [00:16:00] how I coach, how I treat them, um, you know, how we play at all is based off that, you know, um.
I’m a very hard coach to play for. I think the demands I place on guys are extreme, sometimes unreal. But I love my guys, like my sons, you know, and I would do anything for them. And I, it’s, especially with this team right now, you know, I think there’s definitely a, you know, this team this year we’ve grown through a lot and have to go through a lot of tough situations and kind of seeing us win our night, for me was a very full circle moment.
I was very proud of this group and just. Proud of kind of, I think the health of our program at the moment. Um, in that regard, you know, in terms of playing style, um, you know, if you look, I built our playing style based off what I see in the division one levels and what I see in the USL and MLS levels.
And those levels are very athletic. They’re very fast paced. The ball’s on the ground, it will be there at some points, but it’s played fast and everything’s going forward and there’s a lot of emphasis [00:17:00] on the transition moments and you know, so we try to create that style. So to better prepare our guys when they get to the next level, that they’re not being behind in any means by that.
Matt: Makes sense. Um, well. Obviously you got a lot of time focused in the fall and, and you’re still going, which is great. But talk to me about the spring and that, you know, non-traditional season. What are you guys doing usually then?
Coach: To be honest, like our spring season’s probably a little bit harder than our fall because we don’t have the game days, we don’t have the off we go hard at training.
Um, you know, I mean, we’ll have, um, four to six games, you know, without, we try to play professional teams, division one teams, things like that. Um, but for the most part, I would tell you like, I mean, we, we go hard. Like we we’re, we’re trying to really. You know, we have till February one where we have eight hours.
But then after that, I mean it’s, it’s basically another season. You know, for guys, we really, you know, I think this year [00:18:00] I want us focus a little bit more on individual development players, but I mean, we try to really create a group and a cohesive. Group that we can build on for next fall. You know, it was a little bit tricky last spring for us just because, um, you know, we had had a lot of sophomores the year before and so we were trying to figure out what we could build on where I feel like this year we have a lot of sophomores going to the spring, and so we’re gonna try to build a group for next fall from there.
Okay.
Matt: Well, coach, I really appreciate the insights. I’m gonna leave you with one last question and that is, uh, if you had any advice for, you know, a, a young man going through this college recruiting process right now, what would that be?
Coach: Find what’s right for you. Um, I think there’s a lot of different pathways, a lot of different opportunities, I think be really true to yourself.
Um, you know, and who you are and what you want outta your college experience. I think there’s a lot of kids out there. They say they want one thing and they may want it just for the external status or [00:19:00] the, um, they can post on social media or all that. You know, I think there’s a program out there for everyone.
You just need to be real yourself and honest about what you’re looking for in your college experience. And that’s why I try to tell every kid and I try to lay it bluntly what we are, because I want people that are here for the right reasons. And I think every coach does, and every program has different.
Niches and things that make them right for the individual. So you just have to kind of find that from there.
Matt: Yeah, absolutely. Couldn’t agree more. Well, coach, wish you the best of luck as you try to get that repeat and, uh, sounds good. If you find yourself down in Bradenton for any of those tournaments, uh, gimme a shout.
All right?
Coach: Okay. Sounds good. Take care. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.
