Black Hills State University – Women’s Soccer – Coach John Hutchison
In today’s episode, I speak with Coach John from the Black Hills Women’s Program in South Dakota. We talk about how he likes to focus on local recruiting and high school soccer. Coach also shares about the gorgeous landscapes and supportive community. Plus, we discuss how he focuses on coaching players to where they can’t take themselves. Learn more about Black Hills State University – Pueblo Women’s Soccer.
Matt: [00:00:00] Hi everybody. Welcome to Discover College Soccer. Today I am lucky enough to be joined by Coach John at Black Hills State University. Welcome coach. Appreciate you, man. Thanks for having me. Yeah, thanks for being here. For those who don’t know, black Hills State is in South Dakota. Yep. So probably having a little bit different weather than I am in Florida today.
Uh, but, uh, you know, just, just a few, few thousand miles in between us, you know.
Coach: Yeah. I’ve been getting a lot of wind and snow, but I mean, it’s, when you’re up in the mountains, man, it at least looks pretty. Yeah. Like you are just excited to look outside, so
Matt: For sure. For sure. Well. It is winter time. You know, this weekend is crazy.
You’ve got the, the, the Raleigh, uh, showcase on the East Coast. You got ECNL, Kansas City in the middle of the country and you got the GA in Norco, so, mm-hmm. Uh, just recruiting is, is everywhere, uh, for, for, for everyone these days. So where are you guys at now that the season’s over? [00:01:00] How are you kind of.
Tackling, uh, the, the recruiting and all these events that are happening?
Coach: Yeah, I mean, truth be, we, we’ve started to take a very different approach to recruiting. Um, when I first got here three years ago, there wasn’t a huge, um, a huge team of local kids. And when I say local, I’m not just talking South Dakota ’cause we are 20 miles off the Wyoming border two.
Uh, so it was like, okay, like if we’re gonna start building a team here that the surrounding areas can be proud of, we need to give them people that they’re familiar with. So we, we’ve started to go very heavily into South Dakota and Wyoming. Um, so we ended up with four, four South Dakota freshmen, four South, uh, four Wyoming freshmen.
And now we’re in the process of trying to sprinkle some transfers in and around that from obviously all, all, all different areas. So we. I kind of stayed away from as much of the [00:02:00] bigger, the bigger events, if you like. And we’ve started to look a lot more local. I, I told my staff when I first got here is we need to know who all the best players are, who all the players are in South Dakota and Wyoming.
We need to be incredibly efficient in our own backyard before we start dipping into other people’s. ’cause then you’re fighting the whole country for players. Right. But we, we need to be doing incredibly well even recruiting against the University of Wyoming, South Dakota State University of South Dakota.
If we are going after the same players. We’re in the right pool even if we don’t get them. So that’s how we’ve started to do a ton of that. Wyoming High School starts this, um. In the spring, crazily enough, they have a ton of snow games, uh, south Dakota’s in the fall. So we, that’s another thing we actually pay a bit of attention to is high school games.
The reason being, you can’t pick your high school team. So it tells me a bit more about you as a player, [00:03:00] but even more about you as a person, how you interact with your teammates, how you interact with your coach, how things are going when they’re not going so well. Um, because then I know the type of person I’m going to get when we get you on campus because again, we, we can’t hide from the fact that we are a building.
Program that we’re, we’re trying to work our way up. We’ve, we’ve came quite away these past three years, but we are by no means the finished product and we need to make sure that we have players coming in that are ready to, to be a part of some change and don’t shy away from the process. So I think that’s been kind of our model in terms of how we’ve started to do that Recruiting.
Um. And looking a bit more into high school than, um, club. And even though, yes, the, the quality sometimes isn’t as good, but if you’re pulling the best player out, how are they interacting with the rest of the team? I think that sometimes tells you a lot more than, um, just being, being another player on a club team, if [00:04:00] you like.
Okay.
Matt: Well, in terms of. Your, your timelines, you know, are, are you still, I mean, how far along with you are 20 sixes? Are you looking at 20 sevens? Kinda what does that timeline look like specifically for you guys?
Coach: 26 freshman, uh, we’ve been done for Yeah. Signing day ahead and we’d, we’d been done for months there.
We honestly, we kind of work like a year and a half ahead. Okay. Um, so right now we are, other than obviously the transfers that we’re trying to get in. Because again, you don’t want a freshman class of 14 players, and then when you graduate them, your whole team leaves. Yeah. Um, so we are looking heavily at transfers right now, but yeah, we’re, we’re now starting to get 20 sevens on campus.
We offered the 27, I think a couple weeks ago, and, uh, trying to identify who we want. Well actually we’ve already done the identification. It’s now getting them on campus and. Seeing if they’re the right fit, paying attention to them in their, their high skill games and even whatever other sports they play, [00:05:00] um, to, yeah.
Now start to get that signed up. And then you’d like to have that finished by honestly the end of the semester and then even 28, like we know names, at least again, we’re not in the place of bringing them on campus and stuff like that, but we, um, at least know who we’ve identified and want to start just at paying closer attention.
Matt: And for you guys, what, what is that ideal roster size that you’re trying to hit each year?
Coach: Yeah. We, I used to be about, okay, like 29, 28 is the ideal. Um, we’ve been pretty fortunate though the past year or two where we haven’t got any injuries. So trying to actually manage a, a team of 28 in training and stuff like that.
You try and go 11 via 11, you’ve got five players at the side doing nothing. It’s just, it gets tough. So we, we really do want to try and make sure that our whole team feels valued and feels needed and feels in the game. So I think going into this next year, I think [00:06:00] we’re trimming down to about 25. Uh, we graduated a big class.
We had some other things happens where some players left, so we’re bringing players in. Uh, but yeah, I think 25 is kind of where we’re going to sit. Does that put us in a vulnerable place Injury wise? Yeah, maybe. But I, I think having a team that feels fairly valued, um, and excited to be here and it’s getting the reps and all those kind of things is incredibly important rather than if you are number.
29 on the roster, the three ahead of you get hurt. And now it’s like, okay, now it’s your time. It might be a little more difficult for that kind of player to get, um, motivated for that role. Right. Or even feel ready for it. So yeah.
Matt: Okay. Um, well. How are, I mean, you talked about getting kids on campus. Do you guys do a lot of ID camps or you, your staff work?
External ID camps. Are they important for you guys?
Coach: Yeah. Yeah. That, that’s a big way, right? Is uh, I feel the showcases sometimes Showcases are fantastic, but the [00:07:00] truth is, is I may get five minutes with you over the full course of a weekend. Uh, and the rules of NCAA coaches, right, is I can’t speak to you until the end of the day, so you’re, you’re ready to go eat, you’re ready to go home, whatever it may be.
And I’m trying to have a conversation with you lined up with probably five other coaches that are trying to do the same. So I think, uh, ID camps and residential camps are incredibly exciting because now I can sit down and have lunch with you, watch training, uh, get a hold of you. In different ways. So yeah, we, we’ve traditionally done a, a winter ID camp.
We don’t have one set up this year. Uh, just, um, getting some, uh, time in our own fieldhouse can be difficult sometimes. But the big one we have is our residential camp that we do in the middle of the summer, I think it is. He was a little, a little. A little plug for our, our camp, I think it’s July 19th through July 22nd.
[00:08:00] That’s like a three day residential camp run by college coaches. We have all of our players around to kind of chaperone and immerse you in the culture and all those kind of things, and, and we in the past have gotten. Well, we’ve run that twice now. I think we’ve signed maybe eight or nine players out of it.
Um, so it, it, it isn’t just a, Hey, we need your money. It really is a, I get to interact with you. We, we don’t need the full on official visit because you’ve, you’ve seen campus, you’ve been around us, all those kind of things. That kind of fast tracks a lot of that. And then we put you around a lot of other coaches.
Like I said, you’ve interviewed Northeastern Junior College and, um, who else did we have? We had DOT come on campus. We had College of St. Mary’s. Come on campus. Gillette College. So it’s not just even for us, it’s, it’s a lot of other people, uh, get to have a look at these players too. But that’s been one of our biggest ways of, um.
Getting [00:09:00] players on campus and, and watching you over the course of quite a few days, being able to interact with you, being able to see how you interact with other people, uh, goes a long way into us identifying not even the player that we’re going to get, but the, the person.
Matt: Okay. Awesome. Well. Let’s talk a little bit more about the, the school itself.
Mm-hmm. Um, you’ve been there a, a few years now, kind of what is it that you find is, is awesome about the school? Maybe some things we wouldn’t even know about going through the website.
Coach: Yeah, I, I mean the, the landscape of around here is crazy. You think of South Dakota, you think a cold snow flat, right? Um, it’s kind of interesting because you will drive five and a half hours through South Dakota and then you finally hit spearfish and you’re like, oh my God.
Like this is the same state, uh, um. So it’s like we’re, uh, an hour from Mount Rushmore and Custer State Park, and we’re just at [00:10:00] the very tip of Black Hills National Park. Uh, so a lot of beautiful wildlife skiing, all those kind of things, which is fantastic about the area. But the school incredibly well supported in the community.
We are, um. A little bit of a smaller town, 12,000 people, but we just had a basketball game yesterday. I think there was 2000 people there. Uh, football games get, uh, 4,000 people our own soccer games. We’ve now broken our attendance record the past two years. Uh, we are, we’re not at those numbers yet, but we are up there.
I think we got 500 this year, which is for a division two games. Uh, fantastic. So we’re really starting to feel that support from within the community, uh, then the actual school itself. A lot of fantastic degrees, like many schools, but one of our biggest ones is teaching. Uh, elementary ed here is a, a huge degree that a lot of our team, um, have.
And I think one of the great things about Black Hills State, and I can say [00:11:00] this ’cause I’ve been to a couple different skills that I haven’t seen this as much. As by the time your senior year hits, you really are getting pushed out into your work, uh, your career. Um, we had a senior this year who’s elementary ed, and she was in the classroom, um, with first and second graders sounds.
Sounds awful, but, um, no, it, it was fantastic for her because now when she graduates this next year, she’s not gonna be caught off guard by, oh my God, I’m, I’m terrified to do this. She’s already been through it. And it’s the same thing with putting our kids into hospitals or putting our kids into business internships or stuff like that.
We, we are very adamant about getting kids out of campus, if you like, and into the, into their career path.
Matt: That’s awesome. Yeah. Well, we mentioned the academic component and you know, it can be hard for. Players to come into college and really have to balance the demands of being a student [00:12:00] and an athlete.
Yeah. Um, so kind of how do your players make sure they’re successful on both sides of that coin and, and what kind of support systems has the school offered to help ensure that as well?
Coach: Yeah, our, we just got a, a brand new library built, which is now kinda just became a full on support center. Um, something that we’ve started to realize is most kids, especially freshmen coming in, have close to zero time management skills.
Um, so it’s really leaning on each other to be able to navigate through that. ’cause we, we talk about like, life doesn’t get easier, right? You just get better at dealing with it. Um, so it’s leaning on each other to make sure that they know how to navigate through those things. But we’re very huge on making sure that the calendar and everything’s set, like we don’t change things around a ton.
Even though college season, it happens from time to time. But, um, our team are huge on supporting each other through, um, those mishaps and things that happen and comforting freshmen and stuff like that [00:13:00] to, um, again, not, not just pick them up every time something goes wrong, but also like, Hey, this is why we can improve in these situations.
And then, I know everybody says this, but we have an incredibly, uh, great. Open door policy to where it really is. It gets kind of hectic in here sometimes to where I have that many people in the office, but it’s awesome at the same time because that’s where the relationships are built. Uh, to, yeah, just check in on, uh, someone might just jump in here for a snack or, or whatever.
Just want to sit down and then it’s turns into a little more of it, like, how’s things going? School Okay. Like finding things. Okay. And it’s just constantly making sure you’re checking in and checking up on people. And I’ve been known to. Uh, take a wander up to the calf at the, and kind of sit there for an hour and a half just to check in on people, bumping on people and just kind of make sure that we’re, um, we’re able to be there for them, um, as they navigate through this.
And again, everything is to [00:14:00] empower them to. Be able to think for themselves and, and, and improve on themselves and, and deal with this a bit better.
Matt: Yeah, that’s great. Well, let’s rewind it back to say mid-October or the heart of that RM Max season. Walk me through what’s a typical schedule for a week, uh, for the girls in terms of practices, classes, case.
So yeah, we’re, um.
Coach: Again, our max, incredibly tough conference. It really is like we have three top 25 teams. I think they were all top 10 at one point, and we played two of them back to back, which is a tough week. But going into it, Mondays typically, because we play Friday, Sunday, Mondays for the most part has become a.
We will, we’ll split the team up into their individual units and do some individual, um, training forwards to get some finishing and, uh, fill backs, back crossing, maybe some one-on-one defending that kind of stuff. And then we’ll do heavy set pieces. Uh, um, that’s what we’re going to [00:15:00] start doing. Then your Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Tuesday and Wednesday we also lift.
Uh, but it is mostly maintaining everything that you’ve built throughout your whole spring and summer. And then we, we try and ramp training up so that when we get to our game on the Friday, if we’re at home, we will still have a competitive day on a Thursday. I know the science sometimes tells you that you should.
Or, or your body tells you that you should take a dip to prepare for the Friday. It’s interesting when we look at the science of our, our GPS vest and stuff like that, and even talking with the girls, they feel that they need a more competitive day to ramp them up to, to go be, um. The best that they can be for the Friday.
So we, we kind of touch on our principles then, but maybe the, the day before the game is, is heavy, um, pressing and, and things like that to get ’em excited to go play the game. And then if we’re at home, we’ll [00:16:00] obviously play Friday, take Saturday off play Sunday. If we’re away, we will do maybe a 6:00 AM practice just to get out there and kind of get something achieved before we leave on a Thursday night to go play on a Friday and then go play on a sat uh, go play on a Sunday.
Yeah.
Matt: Okay.
Coach: Awesome.
Matt: Well, let’s talk about the, the, the team side of things. I know we talked about Ro uh, roster size in terms of players, but talk to me about your roster size in terms of staff, support, staff who all helps out with the team? What role does everybody play there?
Coach: Yeah, I, it is, it’s been awesome and this is why I know that Black Hills State is moving in the right direction and we are supported by the, the admin team here.
When I first got here, uh, the team had never had a ga. Uh, so we ended up getting a graduate assistant for my first year, and then my second year we got a full-time assistant. So that first year it was just me and the ga. That second year it was me, GA, and assistant, and now we’re, we’re on that path. We’re onto our [00:17:00] second GA and still have the same assistant, but we do a pretty good job of divvying things up.
Again, whether GA it sometimes becomes, okay, what do you want to learn out of this experience? It’s not just that you’re doing this, this, and this. Uh, so our GA right now doesn’t want to coach, so she’s very much been put into a more director of ops, um, and social media manager kind of role, which is going to put her into the business world, which is inevitably where she wants to go.
And then our. Assistant is big in, um, goalkeeping. Uh, he has licenses and stuff, and that wasn’t his role, uh, in the past when he was a head coach, but he’s, he’s went head first into that and we got him the licensing and the education needed for that. And then he’s really been interested in the, the workload, GPS Fest kind of technology.
The data that we get from that stuff too. So it’s all about how ready players are day to day, how much their [00:18:00] workload has been from game to game practice to practice to make sure that we’re still maintaining, um, optimal fitness, if you like. And then he does a ton of individual video stuff with the girls too.
Uh, clipping games for girls in terms of, um. Little things they might need to see coming into the next game to where myself, I will do a lot more feedback to the players, to the team, uh, from previous games. Are we hitting our principles? Are we doing what we need to be doing? Um, are we improving in the areas that we need to be improving?
And, and a lot of it is positives, um, to try and bring those out. And then, yeah, training is kind of, uh. All of us involved as a GA heavy involved in, um, the warmup and stuff like that. Do a lot of. Fun games and relays that everything becomes a shouting match because everybody wants to win and they’re all cheating constantly.
So you need to make new rules and stuff like that. Uh, and then [00:19:00] sometimes me and the assistant go back and forth. I I might be, Hey, I, I just want to observe. I observe a lot today, and he does a lot more. Or it’s, Hey, I wanna be really involved today. I’m going to, I’m going to take a bit more. So,
Matt: yeah. Okay.
Well, talk to us about, about you. Uh, talk to us about. Your coaching style, style of play, you look to play there?
Coach: Yeah, I mean, I mean, I, I’ve had a fantastic, uh, career in terms of the opportunities I’ve been given over here, moved over here. It’s about, what’s that, about 17 years ago? Uh, and just all the coaches and programs I’ve been involved in, um, have really kinda molded what I like and don’t like and stuff like that.
And my, my time at Ottawa, Kansas really molded, kind. Kind of how to manage, uh, female athletes compared to male athletes. ’cause I was on the staffer both there. And then going to the University of Arkansas to be a volunteer assistant really broadened my horizons in terms of Okay. Commitment and mentality.
And, and if you’re [00:20:00] familiar with how they play, you can see why they are the way that they are. Um, so that kind of brought me along into. Where I am now and everything I think is relationship based. Um, my job as a coach is to take you to where you can’t take yourself. Um, every player wants to go to the path of least resistance, and the way that I view as I am and between you and I am constantly pushing you up the hill instead of letting you go down the hill, even though they don’t see in the moment why.
That is important. And again, we got a ton of, uh, going back and forth with players, but in the end, I’ve, I’ve had a lot of players come back to me and appreciate and now have an understanding of why that’s why, how we were. Uh, but I think it simply comes down to, I think soccer. Well, not in soccer, just coaching is 90% social competence and 10% tactics and training and all the other things.
[00:21:00] Right? It’s, uh, my job as, as player management. At the end of the day, it’s making sure our team feels valued, feels loved, um, by the same time, know that we have to achieve some things here. And it’s not always just going to be the way that they view that or the way that they want it to be. Um. So it, it can be tough love every now and again to where, um, you’re getting the best outta people.
But for myself, at the end of the day, it’s, it’s knowing that my players are loved and valued and, and then I love them being around here, but style of play, um, again, we, we want the ball on the ground like everybody else, just because we feel that it’s more controlled there. But I don’t necessarily need to swing the ball 17 times to try and build an attack.
Um, the reason we ended up as successful as we did this year, even though we didn’t win the amount of games that we wanted to, but we chopped down so much, um, from other teams getting opportunities on us, [00:22:00] was defending transitions. Uh, can we control transitions? And we did that so well this year. To give you example.
I think last year we conceded 120 shots. This year we brought that down to 200. Um, for the first time ever we had more shots than we conceded, if you like. Um, so it kind of mentions this. Yeah. Controlling those transition moments was a huge thing for us this year. And that was, um. What we did. I think that just gives you more control in the game.
Everybody thinks control in the game is having the ball. I think you can still do that by how you press and, and where you dictate teams to go. And with where we are within the armac, we know we’re not gonna have the ball the whole time. So it’s, it’s how can you. Solidify yourself defensively. And we, we did a great job at that this year.
So, but yeah. Can we, can we maximize that PCs? Can we get to the goal [00:23:00] quickly and as controlled as possible? And can we stop transitions, uh, and make them beat the entire team, um, in a, in a solid defensive shape?
Matt: Okay. Well, we talked about the season. What about the spring? What are you guys looking, what, what do you generally do in that off season?
I
Coach: think it, the, the team bec uh, the, the fall becomes, everything’s about the team, right? You trying to do a lot of individual development is very tough. Um, because you’re always planning the next game or the next scout or whatever it may be. I think the spring is a fantastic opportunity to improve your, your individuals that make the team, um, getting more of that individual technical ability working on yes, of course your fitness and your strength and conditioning and other things.
These past couple years, our girls have done a fantastic job of really getting excited to get in the weight room and kind of work their way through those benchmarks. But doing a ton of technical work, a lot of indoor, [00:24:00] uh, playing, making sure things are competitive. And then surprisingly enough, we in the past, we’ve got an outside, around the end of February up here.
Uh, the climate here is a little interesting actually. We don’t get as much snow as you would think. Um, so then where we start, okay, can we start piecing together all the technical nuances that you’ve learned to, okay. This is where we want the team to go. Uh, so if we’re trying to implement a formation change or a little, uh, new principle, we’ll try and do that then, and then we will, um.
Going to the end of spring, playing as many games as we can find. I think last year we played seven games, um, across five days. So we would try and do that again, this the end of this year to make sure that okay, are we improving in the areas that we’ve wanted to improve in? Like I said, last year it was big in transitions and, and we did that incredibly well, so, yeah.
Matt: Okay. Awesome. Well, coach, I appreciate your time. I’m gonna leave you with one [00:25:00] last question, and that is, yep. If you had one piece of advice for any girl going through this recruiting process right now, what would that be? Enjoy it.
Coach: I, I think far too many kids put such a huge stress on themself to, oh my God, I need to find the right fit and I need to, uh, make sure I’m playing at the highest level, or whatever it may be.
It’s, enjoy the process. Um, you’re going to find a place that’s right for you. It’s, you’re gonna have a gut feeling at some point, and you’re gonna know, um. When that coach speaks to you or when that that team comes across, or when that location comes up to you that you’re like, oh my God, this is the place for me.
Uh, but yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s enjoy it. Don’t stress yourself up too much. Um, and everybody’s timeline’s different. It’s not when my friend got recruited, I need to get recruited now. It’s, everybody’s different. Everybody’s on a different path and, and, um, yeah, just try and see the glimmers and the, the enjoyment in that process on the way through.[00:26:00]
Matt: Yep. Great advice. Well, thank you coach. Really appreciate it. Best of luck, uh, finishing out the, the recruiting cycle for 20 sevens and getting ready for, for that next conference season. And, uh, we’ll talk to you soon. Yep. Appreciate Matt. Thank you. Thank you.
