Tufts University Men’s Soccer – Coach Kyle Dezotell
On today’s episode, I speak with Coach Kyle from the Tufts Men’s Program in Massachusetts. We talk about how he looks for players with competitive drive. He describes the success of all the Tufts athletic programs. Lastly, we discuss their high standards and expectations within their player driven culture. Learn more about Tufts University.
Matt: [00:00:00] Hi everybody. Welcome to Discover College Soccer. Today I’m lucky enough to be joined by Coach Kyle. D Coach Kyle Dezotell. from Tufts. Welcome coach.
Coach: Thanks, Matt. Thanks for, thanks for having me. Uh, yeah, Kyle Dezotell can be a handful to, to fit those two.
Matt: Well, and then I said coach, and then I, uh, I I need more coffee today.
I think. Uh, anyway, . Well, let’s, uh, let’s talk a little bit about the recruiting side of things for you. Uh, you know, we were just talking beforehand. You were down here in Bradenton for the I img uh, boys Showcase not too long ago. So right now, in terms of your recruiting process, I’m guessing. You’re looking more at 24, so you still got a couple 20 threes left.
Kind of what is your calendar in terms of uh, year to year when you’re recruiting?
Coach: Yeah, we end up, um, at Tufts University and sort of, you know, I think a lot of the, the very high academic, um, level end up being pretty early in, uh, pretty early recruiting process, you know, very, I think more in line with like the division ones than, than a lot of division three.
Um, I’ve been at every other level of division three and um, I know that this time of year. Potentially trying to, trying to bring in a guy or two at most division three schools. Um, for us, we do most of our recruiting through the early decision process, and so our, our 2023 class for all intents and purposes, has been done for.
Uh, nearly five or six months now. Um, so we’re fully onto 2020 fours, you know, starting to identify 20, 20 fives a little [00:01:30] bit. But, um, this is the heavy window for 2020 fours. Um, we have a rule in our, in our league, in the SCA where, um, we’re not allowed to, to. Find out any, any information in terms of admissions and, and pre-reads and things until July.
One entirety of the NSCA has a July one admissions pre-read rule. So, um, prior to July one, it’s just about identifying players and finding, finding players of interest and, and, um, And guys that we would be interested in. And then, um, after July one, we can start to submit admissions information and, and, um, transcripts and such to, to our admissions folks, and then find out if kids are admissible or not.
Um, and then, um, you know, the summer becomes a heavy period for us of kind of getting our class, but most of our class ends up being, you know, for, uh, committing, um, in like July, August and September, uh, in. . Okay.
Matt: Well, in terms of. Your, your recruiting process, I mean, with, I know those, those SCA schools, such high academic schools, I’m sure there’s a lot of interest.
So, you know, how, how much you know, inbound communication do you think you get from, uh, from prospects, you know, on a, on an average weekly basis?
Coach: Yeah. Um, too much to handle . Um, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s certainly, uh, it’s certainly a good thing. And again, like I’ve been at every level of division three from schools where, you know, you [00:03:00] sign up to register to go to whatever the, the Jefferson Cup and, um, you get three emails from kids, um, to now we often choose not to.
And, and register to attend tournaments because we’ll get 300 emails from kids. Um, and so a little bit of both. Um, you know, we certainly try to pay as much attention as we can to, to the incoming emails and, you know, we get a lot of coaches that call and text and, and email about, about players they have.
Um, but. In the end, it ends up being, you know, if we were to just try to watch all the players that reached out to us, um, we’d be, I mean, we’d be chasing shadows. We’d be watching 10 minutes of this game and 10 minutes of that game and flying from field to field. Um, so more, you know, we, we pay attention as much as we can.
Um, you know, when, when, um, an email has a highlight video, we certainly try to watch it and see if there’s something that stands out about a player or, you know, they play for a specific team that we know is a good team in a certain area of the country or whatnot. But we, you know, more or less when we’re going to an event, like we’re gonna identify our own players, um, just because the volume is, I mean, it’s, it’s unbelievable at, at this level.
And again, I’m, I’m fortunate to be here and, and it’s a good problem to have, but 500 plus emails every week from Wow. From the recruits.
Matt: Wow. Well, you, we mentioned IMG Cup and Jefferson Cup, and if you look at your roster, you, you kind of have, uh, a. Geographically diverse roster. So what, what are some of the must [00:04:30] hit events that you and your staff try to get to each year to help identify those players that, that you’ve talked to?
Coach: Yeah, I mean, I think for us, we’re going to every big MLS next event, we’re going to every big E C N L event. Um, and then we’re piecing a couple other events together. Um, this does not mean that. Great players that play in other leagues and for other teams that aren’t OSX or R D C L, or maybe they’re multi-sport athletes that don’t even play club soccer and like, they’re still the outliers.
And, and to me, like I was a two sport athlete, you know, there were parts of the year where I didn’t play soccer. Um, and so I, I still believe you can be a college, um, college Abel soccer player, um, with, with a different path than playing in most X or playing c l. Um, Los Next and ec and l just kind of do a lot of the filtering for us.
It tends to be a lot of the better players do play in those two, kind of under those two acronyms. And um, you know, we, we end, end up spending a fair amount of our time recruiting in those avenues. But if there are players outside of it, outside of those avenues, we certainly are still trying to find ’em.
Um, it ends up often being guys come through our camps in clinics in the spring and summer, um, because we just can’t be everywhere. You know, as much as you want to be. , you know, you, you simply can’t be everywhere as a, as a coach or as a staff.
Matt: No, for sure. Well, one of the things that has kind of proliferated through college soccer these days is the transfer portal.
Um, and I’m just curious at, at a school like yours that does have that high academic criteria, does [00:06:00] that come into play at all in your recruiting process?
Coach: Um, very, very little. Um, you know, we certainly, like, we look at the transfer portal, um, but it’s more of a dream because, uh, the reality is at, at this type of school, I mean, I’ll, I’ll share a story like we’re trying to get a transfer right now, um, for this next, for this next season.
Um, and we won’t know until May if it’s even a possibility because at that point, Tufts University will decide how many transfers they’re going to take in general, in the whole student population, whether. Take any, you know, we’ve, uh, who knows if they’re 35,000 applications these days for like 1500 freshman spots.
So, um, and I know we over enrolled last year, so like, will we take a tra will we take transfers this year? I think, I think we normally do, but um, I would guess, you know, I don’t know the numbers, but I think Tufts University as a whole, like we’re not bringing in 400 transfers as a university. We’re probably bringing in 10 or 15.
Um, and so then, Fingers crossed. Hoping, hoping, um, your athletic director is told, you know, he, he can bring in a few and and you hope, you hope yours is, is one of those few that, that he chooses. Um, and so it’s, it, it, it is still a small part potentially. Um, and, and we’re still, you know, we’ll still go down that route, but it’s not, it’s not a big thing in our world.
Um, we did just have a player. Our starting goalkeeper for the last two years just transferred, um, to the University of New Hampshire. So it does sort of work that way, you know, again, we’re not like, I know there are some D [00:07:30] three s that like bring kids in for a couple years and kind of push them on to division one s and that’s not really how it works here.
Like, very few kids would leave a school like Tufts University. Um, . But for certainly, um, for this player, he wanted to, to chase a, you know, a Division one dream. And he, he’s, he transferred to a top 20 division one men’s soccer program. We’ll, we’ll see how he does. Um, but, uh, you know, we certainly, if that’s a path that someone wants to take, we want the best for the kids.
So it does happen, but it’s still, it’s more of a rarity than a, than a everyday occurrence. Sure.
Matt: Well, in terms of. The players that you do bring in, obviously for you guys academics and making sure they can get admitted is, is kind of priority one. Mm-hmm. . Um, but after that, once you’ve said, okay, this is somebody who we think will, will get admitted and, and can be part of the school, what is your hierarchy of things that you’re looking for, whether it’s on the field stuff or off the field stuff.
Coach: Yeah. Um, yeah, the admissions, the academic side and the admissions side is certainly something that is always in our minds. Um, you know, I think there’s, it’s . You’d be surprised how many really smart kids there are out there, actually. Um, and pleasantly surprised. Um, and, you know, while there’s. A large number of kids are just like, we can’t look at because we can’t get them in.
There’s, there’s, I, I’m, I’m more and more impressed every time I caught recruiting with how many kids actually can, like, fit the bill and how smart they are. Um, and kudos to them and their families for, for bringing them up really well and then taking school so seriously and, and being really smart. [00:09:00] Um, you know, as far as what we’re looking for, um, You know, at, at our level, we’re trying to, we want to compete to win the Nest Act, which we believe is, you know, one of, if not the best Division three soccer conference in the country.
We wanna compete to win national championships in division three. Um, we’re ne we’re never gonna always do both of those things or either of those things, but we always wanna be in the conversations to compete for both of those. Um, I think in terms of what we’re looking for in soccer players, we’re looking for, um, competitive drive is a big one, I think.
Um, The the players are really, Pan out here are just incredibly intrinsically motivated guys who have a really big competitive engine and competitive desire and want to compete for, for championships and for trophies. Um, we look for soccer players to play for our program. You have to have a certain level of technical soccer ability.
We’re or a team that that plays. Um, and you know, It’s, it seems sometimes like can be seen as like a dirty word, but like we also look for athletes like ath athleticism is important in college soccer. The game has relatively unlimited substitutions. It’s really at breakneck speed. Um, set pieces, both sides of, with, with and without.
The ball set pieces stack and defending are really critical and in college soccer. So you need a certain level of athleticism, um, to, to be successful. Uh, those are, those are a few of the things that, that we look for when we’re out on the recruiting.
Matt: Okay. Well, let’s talk a little bit more about the school.[00:10:30]
Um, you guys are right outside Boston. There, it, it is, as we’ve said before, you know, high academic institution. You’ve been there for a couple seasons now. So what are some of the awesome things about Tufts that maybe, uh, we’re not gonna find out just by clicking through the website?
Coach: Yeah, I mean, Tufts has, has grown so much in the last decade.
Um, Mm. You know, we, we compete in the Nest Act, which is an amazing Division three conference, um, in, in many and, and nearly all, all sports or some of the best division three teams in the country com compete in the Nest Act. Um, I think something that makes Tufts just very impressive recently is we, we were just able to, to win the last Director’s Cup.
Um, so we’ve been a, we’ve been like a top 10, top 20, you know, NCAA division three directors, cup school for, you know, for the last couple of decades anyway. Um, but things have really, really improved and increased and, and, um, competitive levels here, here at Tufts in recent years. And, um, the 20 21, 20 22 year was the first year of the Tufts had ever won the Director’s Cup.
So we were seen as, you know, we, we were, um, rewarded with the, the cup. And, um, ultimately that’s to recognize the, the. The best athletic, um, institution in the country in division three. And so really, really special, something we’re really proud of. Um, we obviously, like we take a lot of pride in our men’s soccer program, but we also take pride in our entire athletic department.
And, um, it’s, you know, I think something that, Uh, you know, recruits and families ask like, what makes this place special? You know, when I come to work in general, most of the teams [00:12:00] here win a lot. In general, most of the teams are really competitive. In general, most of the teams are competing for NSCA championships and competing in N C A tournaments, and it’s a fun environment to be.
In when your own program is in that world, but also all the other teams, and you walk down the hallway and, you know, I’m in this horseshoe of coach’s hallway, um, here, and like most of the teams have a lot of success and we work really hard to achieve that success. And our student athletes work really hard to, to keep achieving that success.
But, um, it’s just a fun environment for, for a coach to be part of. But I think more importantly, obviously, is a really fun environment for student athletes to be part of. You’re just, you’re part of an athletic department, part of. You know, a student athlete body where people are chasing national championships and chasing SCA championships and chasing wins and just, it’s a, it’s a really hardworking group of, of people and, um, I feel very fortunate to be part of it, uh, individually, but it’s a really hardworking group of people that, you know, want to want to achieve everything they possibly can athletically.
While still pursuing everything that they possibly can from an academic standpoint, from a cultural standpoint, you know, our students go study abroad. Most, most of them study abroad their junior year, and so they do a lot of things outside of the athletic realm, but that doesn’t deter any, any of them or any of us from, from trying to compete to win national championships.
Matt: No, that’s fantastic. Well, y you just kind of mentioned it a little bit, but h how do your student athletes kind of balance, uh, the, the rigors of both the academic side of things and the athletic side of things, and what kind of [00:13:30] support systems does a school have in place to help them with that?
Coach: Yeah, I always, um, I always tell recruits and families, um, you know, we’re not, we don’t do study halls.
We don’t, um, you know, we don’t mandate like team study halls on Tuesday nights or anything like that because, you know, again, I feel very fortunate about this. Like we don’t have to because our kids are so smart. Um, they’re a lot smarter than I am. They do, you know, they can do some incredible things in the classroom.
Um, we certainly, uh, help and mentor our student athletes and, um, it’s not that everyone on our team gets a perfect 4.0 by any means, um, but I think we have some, you know, some really great support services at, at Tufts University within our, you know, within our, for our entire student population. Um, . And I think, you know, as far as like a, a coaching, coaching staff in our program, we academically monitor all of our first years.
And anyone that needs, needs help beyond that. Um, but again, it’s like our, our team gpa, the last, the last year was a 3.62. Um, and, you know, most of these guys are. Either economics majors or engineers or pre-med. And, um, I can certainly help them with time management and things. Um, but as far as, uh, you know, truly mentoring them in the subjects that they’re studying, I’d be, I’d be lost, uh, as much as anyone.
So, um, you know, they’re, they’re, they’re incredible kids basically, and they are really, really smart. And I think what makes it so special is while they want to win national championships and compete to win national championships, they also want to. As [00:15:00] well as they can do academically. Um, and they want to pursue internships between, you know, their, their sophomore and junior year and their junior and senior year, and they’re gonna end up in, in Boston or New York City or la you know, between, between those semesters.
Um, While they’re, you know, pursuing either graduate school or, or their potential to help into the job market, you know, upon graduation. Um, and again, they’re gonna do all of this while still getting themselves ready to be incredibly competitive college soccer players.
Matt: Well, that’s, that’s great. Well, let’s go back to the fall and.
Kind of take me through what an average week for a player’s gonna look like, you know, in terms of when are they getting up, when’s practice, class, meals, uh, kind of the game cadence and travel and all that kind of stuff. What, what does a week look like for a player?
Coach: Yeah, we always tell players, you know, a week at whatever level you’re at, division one, division two, division three, nai, it’s gonna be busy in the fall, soccer season and in general, they’re gonna look pretty similar, kind of regardless of the level.
Right. And that’s something our kids have to deal with because there are going to be enrolled in really difficult classes and you don’t get any benefits by being a student athlete. Um, and you’re not, you’re not allowed to miss classes. There’s no, there’s no men’s soccer tutors or anything like that for, for our kids.
And so, um, You know, a typical week is, you know, we’re usually on a two game, a two game schedule. So, you know, say typically a Wednesday and a Saturday. And so for us, you know, Monday [00:16:30] training Monday, lift Monday potential film from the, the game on the weekend. Um, Tuesday’s, you know, often a pre-game day and so maybe a little bit lighter of a practice and probably some film and some, some scouting report stuff for the opponent you’re gonna play on Wednesday.
Wednesday’s obviously a game day. Um, We’re fortunate with our location, um, many of the best division three. Schools in the country are in New England and in the Northeast. And so for us, for, you know, for a non-conference game, for example, we often don’t, we don’t have to get on a bus to go find a, you know, like a top 25 or top, top 50 division three team four hours away.
We can drive 20 minutes to Babson, or 30 minutes to m i t or, um, so we don’t, we don’t have to travel too, too much, which helps out from our, you know, certainly from an academic perspective that our kids aren’t missing tons of classes. Um, so Wednesday’s game day, uh, if we can play. In midweek, we try to, so the kids can go to as many classes as possible, you know, while we’re home or away.
Um, Thursday is usually a recovery day, potentially some film from the, from the game on Wednesday. Um, you know, the group that played a lot, you know, in reality isn’t doing too much on Thursday. Um, the group of guys that maybe didn’t play as much, maybe less than 30 minutes or so, we might push it with them a little bit more in training on Thursday.
Friday, you know, you’re quickly into another pre-game day. And so training’s pretty light. Some guys may lift, um, Saturday game day. Uh, and then typically, you know, the NCAA mandates that you take one day off a week. And for us, Sunday is usually our day off. Um, we occasionally in the [00:18:00] play these wild Saturday, Sunday doubleheader back to back weekends, and so that can change.
Um, but typically Sunday is our, is our day off. But it certainly ends up being a busy, you know, a busy, heavy week, two games. Two to four training sessions. You’re probably lifting once or twice. You’re probably in watching film of our games twice, probably. Film of the opponents. We’re about to wa about to play twice.
Um, you know, our film sessions are short, like kids aren’t, we’re not keeping kids in a room to watch 90 minutes anymore. that was 20 years ago when, when you and I were athletes and now we’re like 20 minutes in and out. Cuz I just think that’s the, that’s, that’s where we’re headed in terms of attention span.
Poor people can focus and pay attention. So, um, but it, it, it ended up being heavy. And again, our kids here are taking, you know, 14 to 18 credits in really difficult majors and, and obviously, uh, continuing to do really well academically. But the fall, the fall is heavy. That, that’s for sure. Yeah.
Matt: Well, let’s talk a little bit more about the team and the soccer side of things.
I, I, in terms of your, your roster, is there a roster size that you feel is ideal that you’re trying to, to hit every year?
Coach: Yeah. Covid has made that tough , uh, I, I personally want to be. Below 30. Um, you know, I think, I think when you start to get above 30, just college soccer’s different. Like you can play, you know, I think one of the things that makes our program really special is our depth and that’s made tough successful over the years and made us able to compete for national championships is we feel like our [00:19:30] second 11 is as good as anybody’s second 11 in the country.
Um, and you know, our depth is certainly something that we take a lot of pride in, um, while we, you know, There is a starting 11. There also isn’t a starting 11 in college soccer because at the end of a half you may have eight subs on the field. And so who really cares who started and um, but I think, um, Yeah, I think, I think that is something that makes our program special is, is the depth of the program and, um, we’re gonna continue to to, to, you know, recruit at a as high of a level as possible.
Um, COVID has made things interesting because you’re having, you know, the first year we had seven guys come back for next year. This last year I think we had four guys come back for an extra year next year. Three guys coming back The following year will be the last year of it. So there’s two more seasons, 2023 and 2024, the last two seasons that it will affect, I believe.
Um, and I think we’ll probably have three, two or three guys in 2024 that come back. Um, so we’ve, we’ve been above 30. We’ve been in like the 33, 34, 35 range. So I’m hopeful, um, you know, after we get through the, the kind of the covid years. Um, and then we’re being just a little bit more, um, Uh, intentional in our recruiting.
And so I’ve, my, you know, I, I took over the job only three years ago, so I wanted to put my stamp on the program and bring in some recruiting classes and such. But like this year, we’re only gonna bring in seven guys. Like, we’re gonna max out at seven guys. Cuz I think, I think just getting the roster down to below [00:21:00] 30 would be very valuable.
Matt: Uh, what about your staff? How, how many of ’em are there beside yourself? What role does everybody play? What does that.
Coach: Yeah. Um, I have a great staff. I’m super fortunate. Uh, we have a full-time assistant and a part-time assistant. Um, we’re lucky to have a paid, part-time assistant job. So in division three to have, you know, kind of two paid positions, um, is, you know, a full-time and then a, and a and a paid part-time assistant, um, or is very valuable.
Um, on top of that, we have a volunteer assistant. We have a great athletic trainer and athletic training staff here at Tufts. And then, you know, your strength conditioning. In, in, in our universities, um, you know, we have strength conditioning coaches that work with, with all of our teams. And so, um, overall, I think as far as, you know, like what a division three soccer program could have in terms of staff we have as that we have as good as it can possibly be.
And I’m really lucky to have the staff that we have and, um, you know, I’ll keep pushing for them and, um, Uh, obviously, and, you know, we wanna, we wanna keep increasing jobs and salaries and things in division three’s. It’s something I believe in, actually in, in our profession. So, um, I’m an advocate for, for those guys and for our staff as well.
Matt: Ah, right there with you. Um, well, in terms of your style of coaching team style of play, what does that kind of look like, uh, for your team?
Coach: Yeah. Um, you know, I think, uh, my style of coaching is just setting really high standards. Um, I’m not a yeller or screamer. I’m, I’m, I’m just about, we’re gonna do things at a really high level and that’s [00:22:30] gonna be the expectation, and you’re either gonna meet those expectations and standards or you’re not.
Um, we very, very much here have a player driven culture, which I think is something that makes our program special. Um, our, our players, they know what they want to compete for. They know, they know. They want to compete for NESCAC Championships and they want to compete for NCAA national championships. And fortunately we’ve had players who have done both of those things.
And so we’re able to kind of understand and pass, pass down to, to the younger players like what it actually takes and, um, to compete, to compete at those levels. Um, you know, I think. I think my coaching style is, again, just, just setting high standards, um, and putting the guys in an environment where, where they can thrive.
Um, and then our players, you know, we, we wanna be a high pressing team. We’re a high energy team. We want to get after teams. We wanna, we wanna run, we wanna press, we wanna play in the opponents half as much as possible with them without the ball. Um, we know that set pieces are incredibly crucial in, in, in Division II soccer.
And, and certainly in the NSCA set pieces are really, really important for, you know, on, on both sides of the ball. And so we, we take pride in defending set pieces. We take pride in attacking set pieces. Um, again, like not a dirty word, I think, I think that’s like an set pieces become like another dirty word of.
Part of the game, and I don’t know, large parts of large, large percentage of the goals are scored on set pieces. And so if we can, if we can win the set peace battle, we feel like we’ll, we’ll be in the right positions that we need to be in at the end of the season. Um, but we’re, we pride ourselves on having fun too.
I think that’s something [00:24:00] that, um, yeah. I, I always joked that I, like, I went to Middlebury College, like a really great school, and I chose to be a soccer coach for a living, you know, so like, I’m not making any money and I’m, I’m, but I get to do exactly like. You know, my, my favorite thing in life outside of my family is soccer and being around kids and coaching a team and organizing a team.
And so I get to do that every day. Um, so because of that, like I want it to be fun and doesn’t mean there’s not gonna be hard times and the grind of it at times in season. And we’re gonna push really, really hard. We’re gonna work as a staff really hard. Our players are gonna work hard and it’s not always the most enjoyable when you’re in those moments of incredible hard work.
Um, but hopefully the rewards will be very, very enjoyable and fun. Um, But I think one thing that makes our team special is like, our guys are super competitive and also super goofy. They know when to have a good time. They know that it’s okay to laugh. They know that it’s okay to get after each other in training and you know, maybe talk a little smack to each other and, and push things.
And that’s important for us because at the end of the day, this is like, I, I get to coach a game for a living. So fun has to be part of it. Otherwise, what’s the point of doing any.
Matt: Absolutely love it. Well, coach, you’ve been generous with your time. I always like to end on on this question and that’s what didn’t we talk about.
What else is there that you would like to convey to recruits, whether it’s about the college soccer, recruiting process, about your school, or anything else in general? I would like to leave you with the last word.
Coach: Yeah. Thanks Matt. Thanks for having me. Um, I think the college soccer recruiting process can be daunting and scary.
And, uh, my advice [00:25:30] there and we, you know, we do this when we go work camps and host our own camps and talk to players and families, is, there’s no exact science to this. Every player’s gonna have their own path and their own journey. Don’t be stressed by your teammate or teammates, you know, figuring out their journey before you do.
And, um, I think one thing for me is I always, I think make sure you find the right fit and the best fit. I think as you, we kind of alluded to earlier, the transfer portal is such a massive thing and there’s so many kids that are in the transfer portal these days. So do your due diligence, do your homework, find the best fit.
Don’t try to pick your school based on. The one Instagram post where you’re gonna be wearing a sweatshirt and not realizing that you’re not gonna see the field for the next three years and you’re gonna be looking to transfer and all of those things. Find the right fit, find the school that fits you the best.
Find the program where you can, where you can actually feel a real part of it and play. Um, I think, I think that’s a big piece is, is finding a school where you can actually play. Cause most, most kids wanna play. Um, most kids don’t want to just sit on the bench for four years and they’re obviously, we all fill, we all have rosters to fill and people need to, you know, people will.
Be on the bench, but I think, I think, uh, too many kids just end up at the wrong, at the wrong place, at the wrong level. What, however they’re being pushed there from, from their parents or their, their clubs or whatever. So just find the, find the right fit and find a place where you can actually play and, and you’ll be, you’ll be the happiest.
Matt: Couldn’t agree more. Well, coach, I really appreciate it. Wish you the best of luck, uh, in the fall, and hopefully you can bring home that SQ championship, uh, here in 2023
Coach: Awesome. Thanks so much, Matt. [00:27:00] Appreciate it. Thank you. See ya.
