USL Feature
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
When he took over as coach of the Pittsburgh Riverhounds in 2010, Justin Evans knew he needed to shore up the club’s defense. For the past two years, goalkeeper Hunter Gilstrap has been a key figure in helping the Riverhounds’ defense become one of the best-organized in USL PRO.
But while he has found success, and continued to progress as a player, Gilstrap has also become an integral part of the club.
“[Hunter has] done a fantastic job for us on the field, obviously with making saves but also with his leadership at the back and his organization, and then throughout the organization,” Evans said. “He’s actually started our Riverhounds Goalkeeper Academy, so now he’s in the community and doing a lot of things here for us and the organization as well, so he’s been a massive piece and a joy for us within the organization and the community.”
According to Gilstrap, when the Riverhounds Goalkeeping Academy began a little more than a year ago, it had 12 players from as young as eight years old to as old as 16 attend its first camp. Since then, the program has seen rapid growth, with 60 goalkeepers expected to attend the Academy when it begins its next sessions in two weeks.
For Gilstrap, having the opportunity to coach young goalkeepers, and see their progress, is in many ways more rewarding than anything he’s accomplished in his career so far.
“Coaching is one of the big positives of being involved in this club,” Gilstrap said. “For me, my next step career-wise, I’d like to move into coaching full-time when I’m no longer able to play, so it’s a massive, massive plus being in a club where you can continue to play, but you can also develop your coaching career, so it’s something that’s really exciting for me, and it seems like with our club, every couple of weeks there some new exciting development in terms of what’s around the corner for everyone in the system.”
Certainly, the official announcement of the club’s new home is a great development for the club, which Evans has seen play at local high schools, colleges and even a baseball ground since his first stint with the club began in 1999. Gilstrap believes it will add a new dimension to the Riverhounds and their standing in Pittsburgh.
“One of the first things I noticed when I came to the club was that the majority of people in town know about the Riverhounds, even though it’s a major-league sports town,” Gilstrap said. “Not everyone had been to a game before, but I think this made it a little more real for them, and hopefully I think it’s done a decent job, because of the location, in sparking interest, and I think it’s going to appeal to those people who have never experienced pro soccer at any level before in Pittsburgh, and hopefully it will draw them right in.”
When they get there, they’re likely to see a more positive Riverhounds team than in recent seasons. While Gilstrap refers to the team’s mentality during the past two seasons as one that held a blue-collar work ethic and relied on being a difficult side to break down defensively, the new attacking additions to the side have the 28-year-old excited for the new season.
“I think now we’ve got a much more dynamic attacking group this season, and I think it’s going to take some of that pressure off that we had in the past [defensively],” Gilstrap said. “It’s not necessarily a good thing when you’re playing not to give up goals instead of playing to score goals, so I think that could change for us this year.”
Not that the Riverhounds’ goalkeeper has any intention on doing anything but improve. The USL Second Division Goalkeeper of the Year in 2010, Gilstrap has grown in confidence thanks not only the number of games he’s played, but also because of the support Evans and his coaching staff have provided.
“In this position, you get better the more that you play, and it’s good being with the staff that you know has confidence in you because 99 percent of goalkeeping is mental,” Gilstrap said. “The majority of the game, you’re standing, thinking or talking, you’re not actually involved physically, so when you know you’ve got a staff that believes in you, when you know it’s your position, you’re able to focus on performance, not necessarily focus on not making mistakes.”
With Gilstrap’s confidence high, and the side seeing positive developments in its future, this season could lead to even better things for the Riverhounds as a whole.
“I think if you ask every single person on the team right now, it’s been an incredibly competitive environment in preseason,” Gilstrap said, “and if you go to everyone, player to player, and ask them what their goal is for this season, they’re not going to tell you an individual goal, score ‘X’ number of goals or something, they’ll tell you their goal is to win a championship, and I think that’s going to create a very positive environment."