Teaching a school sports activities staff is just not a straightforward job, but one man diligently managed 4 groups whereas overseeing essentially the most success in his program’s historical past.
Sean Carey took cost of the Lethbridge Polytechnic Kodiaks males’s and ladies’s soccer groups in 2009. He left the varsity in 2011, however returned once more from 2017 and stayed till his current retirement. Throughout this tenure, Carey received 91 common season soccer video games and 37 common season futsal video games.
His second go along with the groups noticed a speedy rise, as the ladies’s staff received a bronze medal in 2018 after lacking out on the playoffs the season earlier than.
“The purpose that yr was simply to make the playoffs, however as soon as we received there, there was a little bit of a sense amongst that staff that we might do very well in that and to return away with the bronze medal,” Carey says, recalling the second. “It nearly felt like we’d received the banner that yr.”
Carey, nonetheless, reached the summit of the Alberta Schools Athletic Convention (ACAC) in 2019 when the boys’s staff took house the gold medal.
“[That season] is at all times going to be one of many highlights.” he says. “Going to the nationwide championships, successful a banner, beating a staff that hadn’t misplaced in two years. That group of boys have been constructed for one motive and that staff was put collectively for one motive.”
His accolades don’t cease there. Carey was named the ACAC ladies’s Coach of the Yr on 4 events, the ACAC males’s Coach of the Yr on two events and he was as soon as declared the nationwide males’s Coach of the Yr by the Canadian Collegiate Athletic Affiliation (CCAA).
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“We have been aggressive the entire time I used to be a coach right here and do I take delight, yeah, completely I do, nevertheless it wasn’t the spotlight of it for me,” Carey says.
Regardless of the awards and acknowledgements, Carey says teaching a collegiate staff is all about creating scholar athletes, not concerning the recognition.
“It’s concerning the athletes, it’s about them turning into higher variations of themselves. That’s the way in which I take a look at loads of this. So, wins are a bonus and the medals and all the remainder of it. On the finish of the day, as a coach at this degree, it’s all about your athletes.”
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This was a purpose through which he was profitable, evidenced by his groups averaging six scholar athletes per season acknowledged with All Convention and Nationwide Tutorial Honours.
“Now, yearly, you see our soccer groups are proper within the lead. If not main, proper there near it on their educational work,” says Todd Caughlin, athletics director for Kodiaks Athletics. “So, you do this and also you present it like our groups have finished, each our males’s and ladies’s, you’re leaving it in a great place. Sean’s promoted that and I’ve actually appreciated it.”
Caughlin goes on to say the educational standing for soccer gamers at Lethbridge School — as Lethbridge Polytechnic was once recognized — was merely not ok when Carey first arrived, a scenario the coach quickly corrected.
“We couldn’t have requested for something extra,” Caughlin says, including that Carey’s retirement is a loss for the varsity. It’s a tragic day, however excited for him.”
Past the awards, his personal gamers say Carey had a profound impression on their lives. This consists of Sammy Demchuk, a goalkeeper who says Carey helped her construct confidence.
“He’s at all times been good at serving to me additional myself and once more the boldness, even off the sphere,” Demchuk says. “I grew up taking part in futsal so much longer than he’s been teaching it and simply the respect that he gave me for serving to him with concepts for what we might do.”
Megan Morrison, a midfielder, says she’s pleased with what Carey managed and is gloomy to see him go.
“It’s very nice for him, I’m actually pleased that he’s transferring on and he’s received good issues going, nevertheless it’s clearly very unhappy for us.”
Each gamers have been part of the 2023-24 ladies’s soccer staff that made a dream run, going 11-1 within the common season.
“I’ve received plenty of medals with Sean, whether or not bronze or final yr in futsal we received silver,” Morrison says. “Seeing how a lot he places in and the way a lot he tries to develop his athletes in and out of doors the game is very nice.”
Carey says retirement means he’ll hit the green extra usually and spend extra time on his farm. Nonetheless, he won’t ever cease supporting the staff that he devoted over a decade of his life to.
“I’ll at all times be a fan. A few of my gamers that I recruited 4 or 5 years in the past are going into their fifth yr, they’ll be taking part in this fall. So, I wish to see the place they go, I wish to see what occurs to them. It’s simply an thrilling chapter and I simply couldn’t give the 100 per cent that I’ve given the final six or seven years transferring ahead. So, therefore the rationale I made the choice to step away so another person can provide it their 100 per cent, which is just honest for the athletes.”
Different notable profession accomplishments for Carey embrace managing 18 ladies’s and 17 males’s All-Convention gamers, teaching the XX males’s and XX ladies’s All-Canadians and competing on the CCAA nationwide championships.
The Kodiaks are anticipated to announce Carey’s substitute quickly.
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