King University Women’s Soccer – Coach Paul Shaw

On today’s episode, I speak with Coach Paul Shaw from the King University Women’s Program in Tennessee. We talk about what key attributes he evaluates when looking at players. He describes their unique school and its picturesque location. Lastly, we discuss his school’s adaptive playing style. Learn more about King University.

[00:00:00] Matt: Hi, everybody. Welcome to discover college soccer. I’m lucky enough to be joined today by coach Paul Shaw of King University coach. Welcome.

[00:00:09] Coach: Hey Matt. Thanks for having me and, uh, you know, allowing us to share some of the things here, especially. Yeah, no, I

[00:00:15] Matt: think it’s great. Um, you know, for anybody who’s, who’s driven through Virginia and down into Tennessee, uh, and, and, and been through Bristol.

[00:00:24] It’s a pretty cool place. Uh, I lived in Northern Virginia for awhile, had made that, made that Trek a couple of times. Um, it’s nice. It’s beautiful. You’re yeah. Yeah, for sure. Well, we’ll talk about your location, your school here in a couple more minutes, but. Just by talking about your recruiting process and, uh, and that sort of thing.

[00:00:43] So when do you usually start hearing from players and when are you going to see players? What year are they in, in high school when you start checking them out?

[00:00:51] Coach: Yeah. You know, um, with, uh, with this past couple of years with COVID and everybody getting another year of eligibility with COVID, recruiting’s kind of taken on a, um, More of a strategic plan.

[00:01:05] And here at king, it’s really important for me to, um, establish what the player profile of a successful athlete is here. So it’s insane that, I mean, we get, I was reading through some of the other transcripts with some of the other coaches and I’d echo the same things. A lot of the other coaches say that, you know, we’re going into fall 2022, so you don’t get 2022s.

[00:01:29] A majority are now 2023s. Paving the other day had a 2025, which obviously with NCA rules, I had to respond appropriately, you know, but, um, for us, with recruiting, being a small division two school, and as you know, and Bristol, Tennessee, Northeast part of the country here, I gotta be, um, very descriptive with what the profile of a successful student is.

[00:01:56] And I was taking me a little bit. Get a feel in regards to the community, the culture of our school, where we’re going with our program and feel pretty dialed in with what we are looking for. So as much as I’d like to say, getting emails are great, but establishing a personal connection is really more important for us.

[00:02:17] So

[00:02:17] Matt: what do you like to see in that first communication that helps.

[00:02:22] Coach: Well, um, good question for your families that you’re currently chatting with and for anybody else’s listening to, to this, uh, this zoom webinar, most important thing for us, for me, when I get that initial email is that it is personal, that you actually know about our university versus a cut and paste.

[00:02:46] And that’s very easy to see. Um, that it’s a cut and paste, you know, um, understanding not only the geography, the size of the school. So a coach Paul coach Shaw, I’m looking for a smaller school. I’m looking to, I’m looking at the academics. I’m looking at, uh, sciences at your specific school with, uh, an emphasis in XYZ area.

[00:03:12] So the fact that the, uh, the perspective has done her homework. Um, really comes out quickly in an email and allows me to prioritize the different amount of emails that I get in a day so that I’m not, you know, all of a sudden, if I get the 10 emails I’m going in and responding to all 10 of them automatically, I jumped to the ones that have established that they know about.

[00:03:40] So how

[00:03:40] Matt: many emails would you say you get in a typical week from prospects?

[00:03:45] Coach: It ranges. I’m not concur with a lot of other people on there. You know, I mean, up to today, I’ve already, it’s what one o’clock today. And I’ve already gotten a half a dozen today, but there’s also no significant soccer event happening in our area this weekend.

[00:04:04] Um, there’s a couple happening in different parts of the country, which I’ll get those. But like, you know, last weekend there was, uh, a big showcase happening. Well, I’m going to get a bunch of emails going into that showcase. So, you know, today it’s a half a dozen going into a weekend. They will be, you know, triple that.

[00:04:25] Um, which again, if I’m getting an email, if I’m going into X, Y, Z event that we’ve registered to be at, and I’m getting emails from somebody on a Thursday night or a Friday, Um, that’s probably too late for us. Um, when I go to an event, I want to know who I’m seeing ahead of time. I want to have already had a conversation with her.

[00:04:49] Just again, establish that profile from, is it somebody that would actually be interested in our school or is it just one of those? Hey, I’m just sending out to all these coaches that are in division two in this. Right,

[00:05:03] Matt: right. Well, you talk about, you know, XYZ event. What, what are some of the key events, uh, tournaments showcases that you make sure you get to whether locally, regionally, or

[00:05:14] Coach: nationally?

[00:05:15] Yeah, well, we’ve really focused in, on regionally first take care of our own backyard. So whether it’s last weekend, there was an ECNL that in Texas. Um, so there’s obviously other events happening in Tennessee that have to do with ease, you know, or, or the Carolinas, um, there’s USY events. There’s, you know, I guess I’ll go through the recent showcases that we’ve been at.

[00:05:41] Um, you know, we had the Bethesda event a couple of weeks ago. That was more of a USY as type of event, um, VDI. Soccer up in, uh, Northern Virginia where you’re from. They would showcase

[00:05:56] Matt: my daughter played there for the two years. Uh, we weren’t here in Florida, so yeah, I know.

[00:06:03] Coach: There you go. So make sure I’m from Virginia, so we’ll make sure we hit all the Virginia events, whether it’s CCL or, um, a us club event, then we’ll definitely make sure that we’re at, um, last weekend or two weekends ago, I was in Memphis for the regional ODP.

[00:06:20] Um, so we were trying to get around and, you know, as you know, in our country, we’ve got these different formats for youth soccer. Right. Which. You know, if you go to bed one night and you wake up, it can be something different da obviously with a girls academy league, it was, you know, so we do try to hit all these different events, but not the other, the key thing though, is that whatever event we’re going to, that we know who we’re looking at before we get them to establish a connection with that person so that we’re not walking in with a list of 40 names or walking the list with a little bit more strategically.

[00:07:01] Matt: So let’s let’s so let’s say you’re at an event, you, you got your list, right? So what, what are you looking at? What’s your hierarchy of, of qualities, whether that’s on the field or off the field?

[00:07:13] Coach: Yeah, so we’ve broken it down to five areas and, uh, you know, first air is always going to be. Right. And within character, there are a couple of key things that pop out, you know, not only their behavior when they get subbed and things like that.

[00:07:28] I think every coach will we’ll, we’ll, we’ll, we’ll get into that. And, um, love talking with high school coaches, because then you can see what they’re like in their own high school, where they’re more than likely they are a leader in their high school. So that’s really, really important. So leadership qualities pop into there as well.

[00:07:44] If they’re on a bigger event, sometimes you don’t get to see the leadership. Um, within the character, obviously the human elements, um, very important for us that, uh, we established what their mindset is, their growth mindset, and that’s where the conversations ahead of time come in. So, you know, you, you have, you ask some leading questions, then you find out about their goals setting and how they deal with frustrations.

[00:08:07] Then you get an idea of what their mindset is. And that’s why, again, it’s really important for me to, and my, uh, my assistant, your to really get to know them before we walk in. So that’s one area. Um, the number one soccer aspect of it is, uh, reading the. Right there, if you want to call it their soccer intelligence.

[00:08:32] So based on the position they’re playing, there are a couple of things that, uh, we look for based on our play model. So we have established a game model of how king women’s soccer plays. So for example, if we’re looking at, um, a number nine set or four, right. Um, it’s really important for us that, uh, Uh, center forward.

[00:08:58] I’m not going to give away everything, but it’s really important for us that a set of four she’s able to hold up the ball. That’d be like one of her six job descriptions that she needs to do. And so when we’re looking at, uh, Matthew playing upfront and, uh, If we are trying to evaluate whether or not she will fit into our game model.

[00:09:22] And that’s one of the things we will look up well, is she making the decisions to flick it on, to turn or to hold up, play that specific decision. And each position were broken down with exactly what we’re looking for. So that’s reading the game, um, and the, uh, the technical tactical piece, you know, Ability to break lines is very important for a number nine because in college soccer, a lot of it’s a high press, right?

[00:09:50] So you kind of be able to go through that. And then the last piece would be fitness. We rate fitness as the last piece of more, more than likely that has more to do with, um, speed and small areas than power in one V one challenges. So that’s kind of how we looked at things. All right. That makes sense. Um,

[00:10:11] Matt: what about, uh, camps?

[00:10:13] Do you have ID camps? You run at your school.

[00:10:17] Coach: Yeah. I’m glad you brought that up. That’s been huge for us, you know, with COVID and I’m I’m in my second season here. So I, I got hired doing COVID so as soon as I got here, I was like, Paul, meet the team. And my second meeting with the team was like, ah, there’s no, Right.

[00:10:40] So we’ve really be brutally honest. COVID probably helped me more than aids thing because it gave me a full preseason with a team that I just met. Um, well, we were able to do an ID camp, I guess last summer, summer 2020 was our first ID camp that we had done here. A couple of. And from that ID camp, we’ve, uh, signed three for next fall.

[00:11:10] Uh, recently we did an ID camp for 2020 threes and we had a 20, 22 show up and we signed for as well. And the thing for us with the ID camps is that, you know, as I said at the beginning, I want you to know about Kik. I want you to be vested in the school and I’ve done your whole. And, uh, the young woman that we had come to the ID camp.

[00:11:33] Well, the only thing that come here, if they want to go here, right. And then, you know, then you start looking through the, those elements that I talked about is that yeah. You know what, those four young women in those two ID camps, they fit with what we want to do here. So, so we will run one in the summer.

[00:11:50] Uh, we’ll run one in the fall and one run one in the winter time. So we’ll do three ID camps. We’ll do soccer camps as well, but it’s going to be mainly for middle and elementary school players, more of a community thing. Okay.

[00:12:05] Matt: Um, last kind of question on the recruiting trail. What about transfers? Walk ons, and kind of what I would say, the non traditional recruiting process folks, um,

[00:12:19] Coach: really, really important.

[00:12:20] Um, we, you know, you got that lovely transfer portal. Which I know every coach and I can, I can just feel the cringe coming out of the screen here. Yeah. Cause I think, I think the portal now, the last time I checked was up to like 1200 names or something like that while it’s it’s on believe. And I fully understand the reason why it’s, uh, it’s, it’s a challenge though.

[00:12:45] Um, we don’t go dipping in the portal unless it’s a, it’s a positional need. So. Um, transfers, uh, we’ll have a couple of transfers. Usually the transfer is someone that reaches out to us and then we’ll do our homework. Um, so we won’t necessarily spend time going through the portal and contacting people unless they come across our table.

[00:13:13] Um, because we feel that, uh, Where we’re going in the cultural or a program that, that makes sense. Now again, positional need definitely. And we’ve definitely dipped into the portal and being able to access and had players signed from the portal that we’ve gone after, but it’s basically because, Hey, we need this right now.

[00:13:37] Yeah, right. Walk-ons of course yet. We’ve got a fantastic story happening here at king, where we’ve had a walk on that showed up in. In August. And, uh, she started training with us. Um, we open our spring season on Thursday and I’m going to give her some time on Thursday and I think it’s just a great story.

[00:13:58] So always, we always would open people with welcome arms and get them shot. Oh,

[00:14:03] Matt: that that’s fantastic.

[00:14:05] Coach: Um, you know, with

[00:14:08] Matt: whether it’s a recruit or, or walk ons or, or. Transfers anything really, but let’s, let’s talk about the financial side of it a bit. You guys are NCAA to division two. So, um, you got some money, but, but you know, not enough for everybody.

[00:14:23] So what’s the mix of scholarships at your school with regards to academics, athletics. How does that kind of balance out? Yeah,

[00:14:30] Coach: there’s three different. Maybe four different ways to, uh, reduce that price tag for family. I’ve got three daughters, two of them are in college, so, so yeah, yeah, yeah. I’m taking notes for you, man.

[00:14:49] But when it comes to finances, that’s always a very open discussion because of what, um, of what private school costs. Um, Academics are extremely important. And if a student is pushing above a three, um, three QM GPA, then that opens up a lot of doors for them, especially if they’re a Tennessee resident, because the state government here offers different grants and scholarships to you.

[00:15:20] So right off the bat, academics is huge. And you know, when I started talking about the profile of a student, Of, uh, of success here. Not that GPA would hinder me looking at somebody, but definitely in the latter part of our conversations, we talk about money. Um, so academics, uh, can make up to, well, let me calculate it out

[00:15:50] easily. A half a ride. Could come out of academics. Um, there are scholarships on campus that have to do with need based. Um, there scholarships on campus for a woman in sciences and, and other things that you can look in the honors college and things like that. Before we even look at, um, athletic monies.

[00:16:13] When we start looking at athletic athletic monies, then I start to look from the standpoint of. Immediate impact on the field. Um, and as quite frankly, recently, it’s been, you know, we’ve got some women that have been here for, for a while. And, and again, I’m like two years here, but they’ve been such an important piece to our puzzle and, uh, growing our program that will look at, you know, what I think it’s best for us.

[00:16:45] If we. Invest our monies as almost a thank you to some of our older players, right. That have, uh, been there, done that, and they’re still contributing to the program. So, um, you know, being a program, that’s not, uh, not fully funded, so I’m not gonna, I’m not gonna hide behind that. Um, we have to be very, very, um, strategic with how we spend our athletic.

[00:17:12] So it’s either immediate impact or two as a reward to somebody that’s shown like some big commitment to our program, knowing that we’ve got other avenues for scholarships here at the school.

[00:17:24] Matt: That makes sense. Makes sense. Um, well, let’s talk about the school, right? I, that a lot of people probably haven’t, uh, had the pleasure of, of going through Bristol.

[00:17:34] Uh, but it is, it is definitely an, a gorgeous part of the country. So, you know, besides what I could find by clicking around the website, you know, give, give me the, the inside scoop, what are some awesome things about king that I’m not to, then I’m not going to know without having been there, having you tell me about it.

[00:17:49] Yeah.

[00:17:49] Coach: Well, thanks. Thanks for that segue for me. You know, the one I was looking at, um, opportunities, and there’s a number of things that jump out at king to me as somebody looking at, uh, college positions and quality of academics. I mean, we are, we are a small school, so you’re walking into a classroom of eight to 12 people on average.

[00:18:11] And, you know, with the. Senior junior classes are a little bit more specialized in your class could be smaller. So one of my daughters works great for the other one of my daughter’s like, no, she wants to be in a little bit bigger school. So if you’re looking for something that has very, very, uh, low professor to student ratio, and you definitely need to look at.

[00:18:36] Uh, like the sciences are very, very strong here. We’ve got a really good nursing program. I would say half of our roster of 26 are in the sciences. You know, the, uh, the community, Bristol, Tennessee, small community, a little bit of a cottage area. If you like the outdoors, like hiking, we do a lot of outdoor activities as team bonding.

[00:18:58] Go hiking and things like that to recovery. And, um, one of our seniors has a hiking blog, which I’m like, oh, that’s a new hike to go on. Um, historically king university, um, was an NAI school till about, I think about 12 years ago, maybe. Um, and it’s maintained a lot of the strength of a sport. So the culture at the school right now, we have.

[00:19:26] I think about 75% of the students that go here are athletes. Wow. So now you look at the relationship that you have with professors who are invested in sports. I understand the life of an athlete that, you know, what some days are not going to be a good day because of a, whether it’s resolved practice, uh, coach Shaw said something and got benched, uh, Then they understand that.

[00:19:55] And of course, then they come out to support sports. So we’ve got a really good sport culture at the school here. And then of course being a small campus, you walk around school and everybody knows you. And you know, it’s, from that standpoint, it’s very safe as

[00:20:10] Matt: well. That’s great. Um, you know, you kinda mentioned that that support w.

[00:20:17] Official support mechanisms. Are there in place to help students with their academics and balance that school and sport life?

[00:20:25] Coach: Well, the school does have some things built in, you know, whether it’s a writing. Um, I can’t remember what the term is, but you know, basically you can go have your, your essays looked at and a writing center.

[00:20:37] Matt: Yeah,

[00:20:37] Coach: that’s it. Yeah. That’s what it’s called and you know, there’s counseling available and there’s a number of our students are, uh, I guess work in tutoring for other students within our team. I think as, as a family, what you have to look at is, well, what is the team culture around, um, academics, uh, and the way we have tackled it with our women’s soccer program may not necessarily be the same as some other programs that you know, we’ve we don’t have a study.

[00:21:10] Um, we don’t have, like, you have to show up in the library at X amount of time, especially if you’re like a first year or, or a sophomore. We try to build accountability within our team and establish these small groups. And everybody knows that, uh, you know, they go to, um, Samantha, she’s really good at molecular biology and she’ll be the one that helps you through.

[00:21:31] And we’ve kind of established those accountability groups within our team. So that we’re a little bit more personally. From that standpoint. Um, you know, when, when I first got here, I was like, you know what? Let’s, let’s establish a study hall within the team. And some of the seniors came to me. He goes, Paul, you know, our GPA is like a three, five, I think it was like three, six at a time.

[00:21:53] I was like, why do you want to do a study hall when we’re actually really doing really well right now, you’re just going to give us more work. And I was like, yeah, that, that, that doesn’t make sense to do a study hall for. So there’s definitely those things in place, but within our own team, we have accountability groups that help each other.

[00:22:09] Look after

[00:22:15] you’re on mute.

[00:22:17] Matt: Dang it, sorry. I was here, my wife’s phone going off in the background. So I was commuting to school.

[00:22:22] Coach: Um, I don’t know how many times I’ve gotten on a rant one soon. And, uh, after people, you know, we didn’t hear you cause,

[00:22:30] Matt: well, what, uh, what does it, what does a typical day look like during the season for, for your players, from when they wake up to when they go to bed?

[00:22:38] Coach: Yeah, I guess, um, today’s our first day of our a 45 day in spring season. So, you know, Up until last week, we were in our eight hours a week. So that was significantly different than what it’s going to be right now. And you know, our, our season probably mimics a lot of, uh, other programs in the fall where you’re, you know, you’re playing two games a week and you gotta give a day off for NCA rules.

[00:23:02] And therefore, you know, you got game Wednesday games Friday. So Tuesday and Friday, the day before a game, it’s like, you know, 30% of what you’d actually do. And then the day after the game, the Thursday is going to be like a 20% day from your effort. And then Monday, because you had Sunday off. So like the whole week during seasons, really about recovery, right.

[00:23:26] And maybe a little bit of again and getting ready for the next appointment. Love the spring because now we get to spend some time working on what each person’s got to evolve. So we’re coming out of eight hours a week where the players are lifting twice a week and then on the field. Twice a week as well with some individual things built in.

[00:23:47] Um, today we’re on the field at four o’clock from probably an hour and a half tomorrow. We’ll be on the field for another hour, maybe an hour. And then we open up our spring season that, uh, ETS Eastern Tennessee state on Thursday night. Um, so the, the spring we are training. Four or five times a week. We, as a division, two school are allowed five play dates, so to speak.

[00:24:14] And so now it’s up to me to figure out when those play dates are. And, um, you know, I believe that our schedule is built such that it respects your academics and we take into account everybody’s class schedule before we actually build in the, um, The desired training sessions. Um, so from that standpoint, I believe that, uh, you know, it’s not too challenging, but then again, you know, it’s called a sport and you got, uh, you got college level classes, so it’s gonna take some work.

[00:24:53] Matt: You said molecular biology and my head just started hurting. Uh,

[00:25:00] Coach: I had to write that word down before I said it. Well,

[00:25:05] Matt: You know, let’s talk about travel a little bit and how that kind of can interrupt the school week. You know what your conference has conference Carolinas, but what, what’s your average travel? What do you usually do for a non-conference stuff? And how does that factor into players academics?

[00:25:21] Coach: So I’m currently in our Springsteens and we will not miss any classes for any. All right. That’s kind of the culture of our school yet. So the fact that we’re playing on Thursday night, that’s based on the fact that, uh, that’s not going to impact anybody. Um, during the fall season, you know, we’ve got, uh, 13 teams in our conference, therefore that’s 12 games.

[00:25:47] Um, and if I’m building an outer conference schedule, I’m looking at four to six games, maybe, you know, um, So our article owner’s conference schedule, we’re, we’re really blessed in the fact that we’ve got a lot of really good competition in the Southeast here. You know, so our travel and the relationships that I have with the other schools around us allow us quite frankly, to have a really good, challenging outer conference schedule.

[00:26:15] And that’s paramount for us. In order to prepare us for our conference schedule. Um, the furthest conference opponent to us is probably four and a half hours away. And we usually schedule those on weekends so that it’s an overnight trip. There are four schools in our conference, which we will go on overnight trips when again, that will be a weekend.

[00:26:38] So there’ll be no missed time from classes. Um, we do not play any. So everything will be like one game of the weekend. Then either Thursday or sorry, Wednesday, Tuesday games, the Wednesday and Tuesday games that may encompass some this time. But usually, maybe it’s an afternoon class is because we’ve got a couple of points that are maybe two hours away from us.

[00:27:00] And, uh, you know, sometimes we’re playing on a weekday where, you know, the games at two o’clock or something based on lights and travel and that type of thing. So you may miss you. We’ll miss you. We’ll miss some afternoon class. But in all, honestly, Matthew, I mean, the players have got their schedules. Well, ahead of time, the relationship we have with the professors, where we can be proactive to making sure that, uh, that our women on our team make up for what they’re going to miss or, or they get done ahead of time.

[00:27:30] Yeah.

[00:27:31] Matt: Okay. Uh, well, let’s, let’s talk about the team and, and, you know, you mentioned you carry about 26 players, you know, if I’m an incoming freshmen and is it, do I have a chance to play or am I developing? Yeah. Um, so what, how many do you like to bring in? And now we’ll take COVID out of it. Change the landscape, but moving forward, I mean, are you trying to bring in the same amount of players every year or is it just ebb and flow with your, with your graduating

[00:27:57] Coach: classes?

[00:27:57] Yeah, it’s probably going to be more of an ebb and flow this year. Um, we had, uh, six gradually.

[00:28:12] Um,

[00:28:21] Matt: what can you tell me about that? That’s not like you said two to two in the weeds or too

[00:28:25] Coach: proprietary, actually, if you want to go in the weeds, we’ll be on here for another hour and a half. I have no problem with sharing what we’re doing here. So if any coaches out there that, Hey, how are you doing some things?

[00:28:38] No problem. I guess, I guess the best way to describe our style of play is adaptive. You know, um, everybody will romance about, yeah, you know what? We want to play possession soccer bill from the back. And of course those things are going to be in it. However, each opponent’s a little different and, um, the role that myself and, uh, Alex, uh, our assistant here has.

[00:29:06] Create an opportunity where players have the power to make some decisions on the field. So we will set up a format, we’ll set up a game model. This is what we are going to do with the flexibility within there. So as much as like today’s session, we’re going to be working on zonal, defending in the midfield.

[00:29:24] Um, Next week’s session is going to be on building out of the back. Cause we want to be able to do those things, but also recognize when you know what, sometimes we’re not going to be able to do that. So we’re going to have to make that decision on the, uh, on the cuff, but we will have a basic of, yeah, we want to play, we want to put the ball down in play.

[00:29:43] No question about that, but recognize that sometimes that’s just not on it. We want our players to be able to go, okay. Let’s uh, we’ve got to change this now. And sometimes being 60 yards away on the sidelines. Romancing about what’s happening on the field. It’s too late. So we want to give our players a power to.

[00:30:01] Matt: Uh, that’s, that’s fantastic. Love to hear that. Um, well coach, we we’ve had a wonderful conversation. Uh, you know, I want to go to king now, but, uh, but you know, I, it is, it is, uh, I burned mine many, many moons ago, so, um, so the last question I have for you give everybody, you know, what did we miss? What’s the, what’s something else that maybe we didn’t cover that you want any prospects, parents, or anybody to know that, that we didn’t talk about.

[00:30:31] Coach: Um, we covered quite a bit, you know, but the key thing that I want her to really reaffirmed with families is, you know, whether it’s king or another university, I saw that, you know, you, you talked with some of our other regional opponents in here, get to know the school, you know, re look not only through their website, get on a campus.

[00:30:52] It’s really, really important for us that, uh, perspective get on campus. I’ll have the opportunity to meet our teams. See us train more than play, probably so you can get a real feel for what, uh, what the culture actually is versus the conversation over the phone.

[00:31:13] Matt: Absolutely. Couldn’t agree more. Well, coach, I appreciate the time.

[00:31:17] We wish you the best of luck in the coming season and in your spring games coming up and we’ll keep track of see where you guys are. And if I happen to roll through Bristol, all I’ll stop in and knock on your door. Please do.

[00:31:28] Coach: I’ve got a cup of coffee waiting for you here, man.

[00:31:30] Matt: Fantastic. Thanks coach.

[00:31:31] Appreciate it. Alright.

[00:31:33] Coach: Take care.