USL Feature
Monday, April 30, 2012
When the Baltimore Bohemians went to find the coach that would lead them in their inaugural season, they didn’t have to look very far. Steve Nichols, the legendary coach of the Baltimore Bays, was the obvious choice, and now the man who has led 10 Baltimore Bays sides to national championships is aiming to replicate the success he has found in the PDL.
And with the players at his disposal thanks to his career with the Bays, finding immediate success is certainly at the front of Nichols’ mind.
“Our player pool, just because of our club and the success we’ve had and the players that have moved on, it hasn’t been really hard as far as getting players,” Nichols said by phone recently. “We have a pretty good allotment of players that have passed through that are now in college or are on their way out of college, and then with those friendships, you have a kid like a Chris Sommerville, who’s a freshman at Virginia and started every game for them and was on the Under-20 National Team, he’s bringing up a kid from Duke and two other kids from Virginia with him, so just the connections we had within our club, it’s been pretty easy on the player side.”
Sommerville, and fellow Bays alums J.J. Raley, Mamadou Kansaye, Marquez Fernandez, Andrew Bulls and Christian Barreiro are all set to play for the Bohemians this summer, aiming to continue the success they found in the youth ranks. Fernandez and Kansaye were both part of the Bays U19 side a year ago that won a third national championship, and while the buzz in the city has mainly been over the work the Bohemians’ front office has done in putting the club on the map, there’s also an eagerness to see the side play.
Nichols believes that comes from the city’s thirst for the sport of soccer, which with the exception of the MISL’s Baltimore Blast has gone largely unquenched, but he also believes it comes from the reputation the Bays, and the club’s players, have developed through their consistent success.
“I think it’s a hungry community,” Nichols said. “I think soccer is huge in Baltimore; it’s a pretty big market. I think if you look at soccer and you look at the youth, but then the youth turns into college and the college turns into pros, I think that it’s a hungry community that hasn’t really gotten what I think it rightfully deserves.
“The other thing too is Baltimore is a pretty funny town. You can see it with the Orioles and the Ravens, if you win, the people love it, if you lose, the people don’t like you, and I think even though we haven’t played a game yet, what we’ve accomplished and what a lot of these kids have accomplished in their youth careers, I think people have already labeled us as a winner, even though we haven’t won a game yet, I think people are pretty excited about that. Hopefully we can match that on the field when the games start, and I think we can continue to grow and see what’s next.”
The club has certainly proven a hit off the field already, with iconic jerseys and an inspired sponsorship deal that will see National Bohemian mascot Mr. Boh appear on the club’s uniforms. Nichols has certainly felt the buzz for the team around the city grow, with the team being featured recently in widely read local publication Baltimore Magazine, which has him believing that the club is moving toward something big.
“All I keep hearing is, ‘can you get me a jersey?’,” Nichols said. “Everybody wants one of those jerseys, so it’s been pretty good so far. I just hope when we start playing games it’s received as well.”
With the style of soccer Nichols envisions his side playing, it’s likely the club’s fans will like what they see. After learning from coaches such as Jay Vidovich at Wake Forest, Sasho Cirovski at Maryland and Bruce Arena when he was at Virginia, Nichols has adapted their methods and made them his own, with his sides playing a pressing, attractive style that has brought great success.
“I think the good thing about us, and the reason we should draw pretty well in this league, is we’re not one of those teams that’s going to sit back and sit in,” Nichols said. “We’re a high-pressure team that’s going to come after you for 90 minutes, and we’re not going to stop running for 90 minutes, but at the same time, we’re going to play attractive soccer and we’re going to get results. I think that’s what people in our town like, we’re a blue-collar town that’s tough and strong, and that’s kind of what our player pool is, and I think our players in our roster identify with the town of Baltimore, and that’s why it should go pretty well.”
So how does Nichols envision opening night at Cedar Lane Park on May 19, when the Bohemians host the Ocean City Nor’easters in their inaugural game?
“It’s going to be amazing. No. 1, we’re going to be representing the city of Baltimore, which is an honor in itself,” Nichols said, “and then No. 2 is just to be coaching that player pool that I’ve had … all these guys whose teams have won multiple titles, to now have them at the next level, I think it’s going to be an honor for me to still be able to coach these guys, for all of us to be together. Each one of those teams that I’ve had, and each one of those players that I’ve had, we’ve been to hell and back together, I think that’s the one advantage I have more than anybody else in the PDL.
“The great thing about our kids is a lot of the time kids go off to Wake or Duke or Virginia or UCLA, and they don’t want to come back, but if you call any of our guys, they’d die to come back and play for us, and most of them I haven’t called have called me asking if they can come back. And it’s not about me, it’s about this group and this environment we’ve created here and I just hope that environment continues at the PDL level and we continue to do the same thing we’ve done at the youth level, because if we do, it could be a pretty special thing.”