Eckerd College Women’s Soccer – Coach Luke Sheekey
On today’s episode, I speak with Coach Luke from the Eckerd Women’s Program in Florida. We talk about how he likes to be recruiting everywhere. He describes the amazing campus location including their own beach. Lastly, we discuss how he likes to coach players to make good decisions. Learn more about Eckerd 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 Luke Sheekey from Eckerd College here in Florida. Welcome coach.
Coach Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Matt: Yeah, thank you for being here. I mean, I’ve been doing this about a year and a half now, and I, I am remiss that I haven’t gotten Eckerd on before.
Luckily, we were able to rectify that since I think geographically, you are the closest college soccer program to where I live, although new College of Florida is joining the ranks of any I program. So I think they might, they might beat you by mileage, but they haven’t had a game yet. So, so we won’t count them right?
Good. Well, uh, glad to have you. We’re talking here, August 10th. I think you guys have a scrimmage tonight, even, uh, try to try to dust, dust off the, the, the rust, huh?
Coach: We do. Yeah, we do. Um, we’re on day three and we, we’ve got a scrimmage on, on, uh, tonight against, uh, Polk state, um, junior college, and I’m just excited one to obviously get the girls together the last few days and, um, to, to play a game against opposition, um, is Keith.
For the way that I wanted this preseason to go,
Matt: yeah, well, it’s the first day of school here, uh, for, for my kids. So, uh, I’m sure your, your kids are chomping at the bit, uh, to get going. Um, well, let’s, let’s talk, this is the start of your second season. I know you kind of came, uh, even into the season as the head coach, uh, interim last year, then got named full time and back in January.
Um. So kind of walk me through your [00:01:30] last year from a recruiting standpoint, what, you know, kind of, what was your timeline? Where were you looking? What, what, what did that look like for you?
Coach: Um, well, we’re always looking everywhere. I mean, every school that I’ve been at, we’ve recruited from all over the world and all over the country.
Um, and obviously Canada, Central America, South America too. So, um, even as the interim last year, last fall, um, I told. the athletic director that obviously we didn’t know if I was gonna get the position or take the position. Um, so I recruited as if I was going to be here long term from day one. Um, so during the season we had a number of young ladies commit, um, obviously the being commit to Eckerd College and, and this program was, was first and foremost, the most primary.
Um, concern and then, um, you know, me getting the job and being here long term and then continuing to recruit the players that I felt like we needed, um, throughout the spring. And I think that my staff and I have done a really good job to do that. I mean, we’ve got young ladies from all over the U. S., um, and then we’ve got some young ladies coming in from different, uh, countries across the world too.
Matt: Yeah, and that’s, you know, I, A lot of times division two schools tend to be more, let’s just call it regionally focused in their recruiting. Um, but when you look at the roster you guys have for this fall season, uh, it really is all over the U S. So are there certain events that you like to go to every year to, to see kids kind of what’s on your, your hit list?
Coach: Yeah. [00:03:00] I mean, I think that the split right now that’s happened in the last five or six years between ECNL and the DA, um, has made it. Harder in a way to see everybody at the same event. Um, but it’s made it easier in a way that there’s a lot more events that you can get out to, um, and kind of try and find that diamond in the rough for our division 2 program.
Right? Um, and obviously everybody is trying to do the same thing. thing. So, yeah, we try to get to as many events as we can. Any of the events that are here and around our area were very lucky. How many events are brought to Orlando, Bradenton, Lakewood Ranch, Tampa throughout the year, especially in the winter months that we can get to those events.
Um, and my assistant coach Jason Navas does a great job of that. He’s a lot of events. Um, especially in the summer, a lot of the, uh, the big division one camps he’s been at. So we kind of always got our eyes out there at all times.
Matt: Well, yeah, I was going to say, I think I met Jason at the FGCU camp last year.
So obviously you guys are out and about it at other camps are, is our plans, or do you have your own camps, uh, that you work into your recruiting mix?
Coach: Yeah, absolutely. I think it’s so, so important that young ladies visit with the school, especially small Division two schools. I mean, everybody would love to be in ST Petersburg, Florida, right?
But maybe the college campus or the academics might not be for them. So we put a big emphasis on having anybody that we recruit and attend one of our I. D. Camps. We had to this summer. One was just this past Sunday. Um, they’re [00:04:30] always about 20 to 30 players, which is great. Yeah, absolutely. because we get to coach them on that afternoon morning, whenever it is that they’re with us.
Um, and again, it’s a real emphasis for us that one, they come here to visit our campus and two, they’re coached by me and my staff. And I always kind of say a joke, but I mean it with them is that, like, you know, you may leave here and think, you know what? Coach Luke, he’s a little crazy in his coaching points, and he’s not for me.
And that’s okay. Um, but that’s why our camps are so, so important. So they understand because I tell them again, I’m not changing. The way I’m coaching you today is the way that I coach my young ladies day in, day out. For sure.
Matt: Well, whether it’s at a camp or at one of these events or anything else. Kind of what makes up the hierarchy of things that you’re looking for in a player, whether that’s on the field stuff or off the field stuff?
Coach: Um, I think I’m really big on being able to have a conversation. Um, you know, if you, if you know me, you’d probably be like, sometimes you got to tell me to shut up, you know, but, um, you know, young ladies who can hold a conversation and kind of not on tentative, especially around their parents. And that’s important for me.
Um, and then you’ve got the four aspects of the game, right? The technical, the tactical, the physiological, um, and the psychological. So we’re looking to, especially here in Division two in Florida, we can obviously attract a very, very good student athlete, maybe just outside of the big Division one and maybe the big mid majors.
Um, the high level players might be attracted to Florida and that’s what we want. Um, so [00:06:00] we’re looking to, to tick those four boxes in the best way possible, um, with every young lady that we bring here to Eckerd. Okay, well.
Matt: As a parent, you know, one of the biggest things I’m always looking at is, okay, what’s this?
What’s this going to cost me? Right? So I’m not, I’m not holding it any hard numbers here, but, uh, if you can just kind of give me an overview of an average girl coming into the program, what are they looking at in terms of cost to attend, uh, possible academic scholarships, athletic scholarships. What does all that kind of look like?
Coach: Yeah, it’s a great question because obviously it’s not easy. It’s not hard to find out that Eckerd is a really expensive school. Um, this year we’re going to be just shy of 65, 000 a year, um, which is a very large amount. Now, um, you know, the good students can get anywhere from up to, I should say about 25 to 26, 000.
Um, in academic, that’s the really elite students, um, which we’re trying to recruit, um, regulate the normal, um, high GPA students, probably about 20 to 22, 000 in academic aid. There’s then need based, which I could does a great job of getting money to those need based students that can be up to about another 15, 000.
Um, and then depending on what they qualify in Florida, it can be a little bit more. The one thing that we not struggle with here, but we can’t. You can’t get the need based stuff, um, and the Florida awarded academic stuff, [00:07:30] and then pair that with athletic. Um, so we either go one way or the other. So, you can get the academic scholarship and then athletic, or you can get the academic scholarship and then the need based or the Florida award, um, based, um, scholarship.
So, it’s normally one way or the other, but either way, getting to 65, 000 is tough. Um, so we’re, you know, normally looking for, um, parents, families that are able to contribute quite a sizable number, um, to their, to their young, to their young daughters, um, education. Yeah, well, I get it.
Matt: And, uh, I mean, like you said, it’s, uh, it’s a great place to be.
Uh, your campus is, is right off the skyway there in St. Pete, uh, right near the water. So, uh, I’ve, I’ve been lucky enough to, to attend a game last year. Uh, and I’ve been on campus. It’s, it’s an awesome spot. So you have the. Uh, you know, the insight, not only as a coach for the, for the last few seasons, but you’re also an alum of the program.
So, uh, kind of tell us more about the school, what makes it awesome, what makes it great, maybe some things that aren’t even on the website.
Coach: Um, well, yeah, as you said, it’s right off the 275 in the Skyway Bridge, where if you look on a map, we’re almost in the peninsula, really the very bottom of St.
Petersburg, Florida. I think we’ve got nearly three quarters of a mile of coastline on our campus. So we like to tell everybody about our beach. I always use the beach [00:09:00] emoji when I’m tweeting and on Instagram and obviously the Florida sunshine. Things like that. It’s a very, very high level academic school, um, definitely specialize in marine biology.
Um, all of the biologies, um, very good business school, um, and very, very good majors throughout, um, psychology is a big one right now for young women on our team. We’ve got quite a lot of psychology majors. Um, and it’s just a wonderful campus. I mean, you could probably come on our campus. Be like, oh, you know, there’s no, there’s not many brand new buildings, and there’s a lot of building work going on on colleges and universities across America right now.
But our college has done a very good job of updating the inside of the buildings, and, you know, where we’re located, we’re so near the water, it’s not so easy anymore to just go and build these new 4, 5, 6 story buildings. But we’re very, very lucky with how pretty our campus is, and, you know, whenever we have somebody visit, or people come on a camp, they absolutely fall in love with it, palm trees everywhere.
Um, so yeah, we’re, we’re very, very lucky here for sure.
Matt: You mentioned the academics and, and obviously that student athlete, right? So in terms of the girls coming in, you know, how do they really balance those polls of, of academic commitments and sport commitments and, and what kind of support systems as a school offer to help ensure success on both fronts?
Coach: Well, it definitely starts with us as, as the coaches, um, to make sure that we get the young ladies ready, um, for the load of college soccer. But [00:10:30] obviously, first and foremost, the schoolwork. Um, we’ll have study hall programs, our first year players, our freshmen coming in. We’ll all be involved in six hours of study hall.
And really that’s not, you know, sometimes a study hall is kind of seen as a, as a punishment. Definitely don’t operate in it that way. Um, it’s more of a time management. It’s like, okay, we’re, we’re gonna get all of our study hall players, um, into a room where their phones are gonna be with ours as coaches or the study hall person.
Um, and they’re just gonna be able to be there and get their work done. So it’s really first and foremost about the time management that their parents have probably been orchestrating, um, you know, while they’re at home and, and, and through high school. So, Um, the study hall is a big part for us and our program.
It’s really improving our team GPA. It’s really improving some individuals that maybe needed that little bit of help. Um, the school has great help as well. We don’t necessarily not too many division two schools. Have the maybe athletic, um, academic, um, help that some of the big division one schools have.
Um, but we most definitely have really good academic help here for all of our, all of our majors that will liaise with the professors and there’s certain study hall for each, um. Each area of study set up already for each evening. So the young lady, let’s just say there’s an issue with a psychology class.
We can figure out where she needs to be to get that help for study hall and we’ll make sure that she gets there in the right area with the right professors and with the right students who can help. And so it’s a little [00:12:00] bit more hands on, if you will, not so simple as, you know, just I, young lady comes to me as the head coach and I say, okay, go and see person a or person be there.
The ones who are going to deal with this. This is. This is on us. This is on me and my staff, um, to get our players the help that they need and on the right track.
Matt: Okay. Awesome. Well, I know it’s, uh, you know, August 10th and you got, you’re only a couple of days in, you got a little preseason, uh, tilt tonight, but.
This is probably going to be airing in October, so let’s pretend we’re in October. Um, walk me through what a typical week is going to look like for your players in terms of when is training, when are classes, meals, what’s kind of the game cadence? What does a typical week look like for a player?
Coach: So, yeah, we’ve we’ve really tried to, um, since I’ve arrived here, we’ve really tried to make the week the way that it’s best for our players very early on, it became clear.
Our players didn’t really want to train late in the evening. It became hard to find the correct time to eat in the cafeteria, eating late, all things like that. So we’re going to train every day at five o’clock. Um, and some young ladies will be finishing class at 4. 50. Obviously, not going to be starting at five.
So they know that they’re going to be jetting across campus, which isn’t huge. It’s not far to get ready and get out there and we’ll start as early as we can. And we’ll be done by seven. Sessions are normally 90 minutes, maybe a little more, sometimes a little less. Um, but that’s that’s when we’ll [00:13:30] train.
Um, and then obviously it will depend on on the young lady and their schedule, whether their classes are in the morning, the afternoon or sometimes I might have a class after training that can begin at six or 6 30. Um, so the days will be completely different, especially once we get our preseason for every single player, depending on freshman through senior.
But we found the window that we really like to train, and that’s between the five and the seven p. m. Window. We just think it’s really beneficial. Then that one has coaches we we get off, you know, seven o’clock 7 30 and we’re done and Switch off, but our young ladies, they can get to the library. If they need to, they can study.
If they need to, they can relax. They can switch off from school and soccer. If at that point they need to, which is obviously so important.
Matt: Okay. Awesome. Well, let’s talk a little bit more about the team and the soccer side of things. So, um, You’re in your second season, although your first season, you kind of inherited, uh, the squad, right?
So yeah. In terms of roster size, is there one that you feel is ideal that you’re kind of working towards each year?
Coach: Um, I think that long term, 28 to 29 would be ideal. Um, this year we’re gonna have 32. Um, we brought back as many players as we brought in. Um, so we were right at 16 and 16, 16 new transfers and freshmen.
I mean, 16 returning players, which some coaches, when you tell them that they’re like, Whoa, um, you know, that that’s going to be a tough one. But we wanted to make sure that we had [00:15:00] competition in every position 234 times over. We wanted to make sure that there wasn’t too much too much pressure on any of the freshmen coming in.
And we wanted to make sure that, you know, we’re going to be able to get players rests last year with with the numbers that we had, especially towards the end. Um, you know, master staff and I were looking down towards the bench and it was like, okay, can she play this position because somebody needed a rest or somebody was injured?
Um, and we, we were very low on numbers and we didn’t want that to happen again, you know, as the cause of injuries, um, things like that, especially in Florida. Um, so we wanted to make sure that we had enough competition, but I definitely don’t want 32 moving forward. Um, the high twenties would be where I would like it.
Matt: Well, besides, uh, the roster of players, you have a roster of staff. You’ve mentioned, uh, Jason among others. So can you just discuss who all’s on your staff? What role do they play? Are there, is there kind of athletic department support staff that help with that, with the team as well?
Coach: Yeah, that’s all. I have three, um, volunteer staff and the first one is Jason Navas.
Who’s coming into year four now. Um, with the program, and, um, he really helped me when I arrived and, um, you know, give me good information on the players and, um, and the past and what they want moving forward. And it’s just been a great person for me to have. Um, and, you know, works incredibly hard. He’s, he’s local coaches in the club scene around here.
And like I said earlier, does a lot of the recruiting events and a lot of the summer camps. Um, we’ve got Shawna Griffin. [00:16:30] Um, she’s not with us right now. She just had a baby last week. Um, so we’re super excited to meet their little boy Alfie, her and her wife. And they got one other young girl, and she’s been a great addition.
Shawna was my graduate assistant coach when I was at Delta State in Mississippi many years ago. Um, and there’s a teacher here in the Tampa area. So when I came down here, I called her up and was like, Hey, I need you. Um, unfortunately she came running and she’s here as often as she can. And then we’re super fortunate that we’ve got a wonderful goalkeeper coach that, that we’ve added to our staff recently.
Um, volunteer again. Um, but Tyler Moore, who’s the weatherman here on Channel 10 , um, we had a good chuckle with that the first time that he, he came out for a training session. Um, but he’s been a brilliant addition. Um, you know, having a goalkeeper coach is so, so important and our four young ladies, um, are loving working with him and really getting to improve every day.
Matt: Oh, that’s fantastic. Well, how would you, you mentioned a little bit earlier that the way you coach, uh, at a camp is going to be the way they’re going to see you if they’re on the team. So talk to me a little bit more about that style of coaching. How would you describe it? How would you describe the team style of play and what you guys are trying to do on the field?
Coach: Um, I to bring the energy every single day. Um, it’s been a little tough this week, you know, with like morning sessions and evening sessions and being delayed because of the turf and the heat and that sort of stuff with this El Nino year, which I’ve learned about this year and knew nothing about that before.
Um, but yeah, I tried to bring the energy every day and I’m really, really [00:18:00] big on the technical aspects of the game. I really want to take away the technical breakdowns that we do because I want to be able to move the ball around the field. I want a lot of good movement from players. I really want to attack teams.
Um, and I want our players to go and express themselves, especially in the final third when we’re going to goal. Um, and I want to be able to play out from the back, um, at the right times with young ladies make. can write decisions. And that’s what we’re trying to coach. We’re trying to coach players making good decisions on the ball and off the ball with movement and tracking and how they defend and how they attack.
Um, because I don’t want to be this this joystick coach, which, you know, sometimes you have to be. But I really want us to get us. I really want to get this group and this team to a point where where I’m not like that. And that just comes every day. Um, you know, going over repetitive, um, things every single day so that they know what we expect, what we want.
Um, and then obviously coaching it during the game, but then also going over film, um, with all the different player groups, um, after each game. So that’s something that we’re looking forward to this year. We weren’t really able to do it a lot last year because of the video capabilities that we had. Um, but this year we’ve got everything that we need.
Our administration have done a great job for this program this year. Um, and getting everything we need so that we can coach and get them to where we want them to be. Awesome.
Matt: Well, I like to end these the same way, and that’s, uh, if you had one, uh, [00:19:30] piece of advice, one bit of information that you wish every family, parent, player going through the college recruitment process knew, what would that be?
Coach: Wow. Um, you know, we get to answer a lot of questions when we do these q and as and, um, the one, the one big thing that I. Two things I always try to get out. One is that there’s a level in college for everybody. There really is. Whether it’s these, you know, Power 5, Division 1 or, or down to your path being through a junior college first, NAIA, Division 3, Division 2, Division 1, wherever that might be.
There really is. A program for everybody, and it’s down to the individual and the parent of the club really. Um,
it’s really down to the club that you’re at, um, your parent and you as an individual to figure out what level that is. Um, you know, there’s no use aiming for these Power five schools if they’re not interested in you. Likewise, there’s no use aiming for Echo in the Sunshine State Conference if, if we’re not interested for, um, in you.
Sometimes it just takes that, that being honest with, with your son or your daughter. Or if they’re old enough and mature enough being honest with themselves, um, to really try to aim to get yourself at the, at the correct level. And sometimes that’s the toughest thing. Um, and I kind of pride myself ID camps on, on being very honest.
I told the 2024s that we had last week. Um, if we’re not interested in you, we’re going to tell you that very, very quickly so that you can move on and go and find a school that will be interested in you.
Matt: No, I love it. [00:21:00] Wish you the best of luck coach. I know, uh, I’m planning on at least getting up to one game this season and, uh, and bringing some of our girls up.
So, uh, hopefully you continue to build on the success from last season and really appreciate your time.
Coach: Appreciate it. Thank you very much. Good luck. Thank you.
