Ephs Soccer 'Wizard ' Enters 33rd Year As Coach
Photos courtesy Williams Sports Info
Mike Russo has been named National Coach of the Year four times.
|
Mike Russo did not invent being humble — he just lives it.
Entering his 33rd year at Williams in 2011, Russo has posted 28 consecutive winning seasons. In 27 of his 32 campaigns, Russo's booters have won at least 10 games in a regular season that contains but 14 contests.
Longtime assistant coach Tom Demeo is quick to point out that "there is no better gentleman in the game of college soccer than Mike Russo. He competes as hard as he can, but he respects every opponent, his kids, and the game itself.
"Every time we go to a youth soccer tournament to look at potential Williams players, a father or mother of someone Mike has recruited in the past will stop him and say hi, even if their son did not go to Williams."
Even more impressive to Demeo, who will be coaching alongside Russo for the 19th year this fall, is what Russo does each year after the Williams Admission Office makes its decisions.
"Up until about five years ago, Mike sent a handwritten note to each of the kids that he recruited that did not get into Williams, telling them that there are a lot of good schools out there and to make the best of their chances wherever they go," he said. "Now there are so many he sends an email."
Demeo shakes his head, turns to the side and then back. Blinking away a tear he says, "Who wouldn't want to play for a coach that knows the game, loves the game, loves his kids, and works at it just as hard as he expects his kids to work?"
Russo might nod his head when you ask him if he was the first college soccer coach in the nation in any division to win national coach of the year honors back-to-back (1987 and 1988), but he will quickly add, "I had some very, very good players." That's Russo-speak for "let's move this conversation along."
Don't even think about asking Russo about the two additional times he was named the national coach of the year!
 The 1984 Eph staff and captains Thomas Bodstrom,left, Ted Murphy GK, Mike Russo, Doug McKenny and Brian Daniel. |
Angela Russo, Mike's wife of 42 years, remembers how excited he was for the beginning of his fourth season (1982). She recalls how he told her, "If we can just win this first game against RPI I think the guys will begin to believe they can be successful and we can have a good season."
After the tough 1-0 loss to RPI she asked Russo, "What does this mean?" He responded softly, "It means I don't think we're going to be here much longer." Nothing could have been further from the truth.
"I think his next option was to go sell grass seed with my father if it didn't work out at Williams," said Angie Russo.
Russo was jolted by the loss to RPI, but there was no way he would cash in his season after one game. He would figure out a way to continue to get the boys to embrace his system, his style of play, and coach the heck out of them.
His teams went from winning just eight games total (2.67/year) in his first three years to making four trips to the NCAA Final Four, winning the 1995 title, finishing second in 1993 and third in both 1998 and 2009.
The 1982 Ephs came together after that first loss and fashioned a four-game win streak that was punctuated by a 1-0 win at Division I Dartmouth. That team turned it around for Russo at Williams, notching his first All-American in back Rob Kusel, class of 1984.
"I learned from Mike that consistency is an essential part of living and performing a productive life," said Kusel. "The way he relates to players is also tremendously consistent: He never raises his voice and he always provides constructive criticism. In my day, his halftime speeches always made us perform better, and we generally outplayed each and every team in the second half because of his tactical abilities."
Winning attracts good athletes and as it turned out, it also attracted two very good two-sport athletes to Williams in Mike Masters (1989) and Dan Calichman (1990), who became perennial All-Americans, and each earned two caps with the U.S. National Team.
 Tom Demeo, left, is marking his 19th year coaching with Russo. Below, a gift to the Russos from Demeo. |
 |
Masters became the first American professional player to score a goal in England's famed Wembley Stadium and Calichman the first American to play in Japan's J-League and was named the Defender of the Year in the inaugural season of MLS while playing for the LA Galaxy.
Calichman, now the head coach at Claremont McKenna College, got his ego bruised when he first showed up at Williams. "I came to Williams as a central midfielder and the first day Mike put me in the back, central back," said Calichman. "I was a little surprised to say the least, but it gave me a long career ... he just knew that central back was the position for me.
"Next to my parents coach Russo has been the biggest influence on my life. He is just a solid person who works hard expects the same from his players. When you put on the Williams shirt you want to win for the team and for him."
Russo is a creature of routine. He leaves his house in The Knolls around 7 a.m. and goes on a run of at least three miles. Oftentimes his route takes him past the men's soccer field on Cole Field as the morning fog is lifting off the Frog Pond and the playing field — a sight not to be missed. Wednesdays are hill days, so Russo sprints from Denison Gatehouse at the bottom of Spring Street to the Susan Hopkins House. He does eight hill sprints every Wednesday.
"Coach Russo is the ultimate student of the game and an amazing tactician," said former Eph standout Brad Murray (1997), the NSCAA National Player of the Year in 1996 and holder of NCAA Tournament scoring record (8). "He's constantly watching and learning from games and practices. As a team we were always so well prepared tactically, mentally, and physically. I always felt like we won our games during practice and game day was just when our opponents found out."
San Jose Earthquakes starting midfielder Khari Stephenson (2004), who has also played numerous times for the Jamaican National Team said, "Coach Russo's greatest strength is getting everyone on the same page. So many times teams have players with huge egos. He was able to get us to play as one, where each player knew his role and executed it for the betterment of the team."
Fourth-year Williams head men's basketball coach Mike Maker has become a close associate of Russo's through a mutual connection with current Notre Dame head soccer coach Bobby Clarke who was at Dartmouth with Maker.
"Bobby raved about Mike as a person and as a coach," said Maker. "I have come to see Mike as a mentor and a role model for me and a lot of people both on campus and in town.
"Mike Russo has a tremendous will to win, but he also has great humility and it is clear he is coaching for all the right reasons. I'm impressed with the large number of lives he's shaped and changed using soccer as his vehicle."
"I refer to Coach Russo as the Wizard of Williamstown, with humble reference to the immortal John Wooden," said Western New England head coach Erin Sullivan (1996), goalie on the 1995 NCAA title team. "Both men have been great purveyors of wisdom and winners, in sport and in life. They teach the game from the ground up, sparing no detail in instruction and extolling the virtues of repetitious practice. The same principles are emphasized — fundamentals, teamwork, self-sacrifice. You must strive to excel in every facet of the game."
In 1995 over Christmas break, Russo called Williams Sports Info Director Dick Quinn to give a heads up that he'd be joining the New England Revolution as an assistant to Frank Stapleton. About three hours later, he called to say he'd changed his mind after the college administration urged him to take a sabbatical, in case he did like the professional game.
"The more I thought about it the more I realized that I already had the best job in the world," he told Quinn. "So I called the Revolution and thanked them for the offer and declined."
The Russo message of competing at all times, in training and in games, and has been carried forward to the 2011 Eph team.
"Nothing matters to coach Russo more than competitiveness, and when you start matching his competitiveness, that's when things get fun," said senior midfielder and co-captain Nick Pugliese. "When you respect the game and want to win it as much as he does, that's when he trusts you to run it. He trusts you to take fun practices seriously, to handle ourselves off the field like professionals, and ultimately to make the decisions on the field. Coach Russo is paradoxically at his best when he is saying the least: He has so thoroughly prepped his players that their performance is an extension of his regimen."
Eph junior back and 2011 co-captain Matt Ratacjzak agreed. "His commitment to excellence and indefatigable hunger for more are enough of a reason to give your heart, body, and soul every time you step on the pitch wearing the Williams colors," he said. "He has taught me that in order to succeed, countless sacrifices must be made for the team and that the focus needs to be on the process, not the final result. Coach is an inspirational figure in our Williams soccer family, for his sheer presence and devotion to the team. He fires guys up like you wouldn't even imagine. It's truly something to experience first-hand."
While the official record indicates that in 1995 when Russo guided the Ephs to the NCAA Division III title his team compiled a record of 17-0-2, the Ephs actually did lose a game that year. Russo's varsity lost to Russo's alumni on Cole Field before the official season began. Even Mike Russo can't out work and out coach Mike Russo sometimes.
The year 1995 found the Ephs winning their first nine games before settling for a 1-1 tie with Amherst on Cole Field. After seven more wins in a row the 1-1 score was duplicated on November 18th in the national semifinals when Russo's boys advanced to the title tilt versus Methodist College after defeating Muhlenberg 6-5 on penalty kicks.
A 2-1 win over previously undefeated Methodist on Cole Field gave the Ephs the NCAA crown.
 Matt Stauffer's retired jersey hangs in Russo's office. |
"I am always struck by what a vastly important role coach Russo had in helping Matt and his friends deal with such a tragedy — at an age when you may be too old to cry to your parents, but not old enough to know that you need to," said Matt's sister Hannah (2005). "Coach Russo ushered Matt and his teammates through what had probably been their most traumatizing life event. And of course he did it with the grace, compassion, and tenderness that are so characteristic of coach Russo."
Matt Stauffer's No. 10 jersey is the only retired number in Williams men's soccer history. There is an annual Run for the Cure race on campus in Stauffer's memory and the presentation of the Matt Stauffer Award to the Eph player "who best exemplifies the highest commitment to excellence both on and off the field."
Russo's wife and son, Derek (now with State Street Bank), know full well Mike's passion for the game and coaching. "It always amazes me how creative he can be as a soccer coach, because he is not that way in life," said Angie. "Everything else he has to make a plan for and there is a process he goes through for getting the job done."
"In my opinion, he is most happy watching a soccer game, drinking a Spaten, munching on peanuts and observing tactical differences in the teams he is watching," said Derek. "He loves to get away to Florida with my mother after the season and relax in South Palm Beach. Their condo is a stone's throw from the beach and he gets his Starbucks coffee and reads The Sun, a British paper, with great football coverage."
Derek admires his father as a great coach, "His passion is coaching and soccer. He has a big heart and is an even better father. He is always there for me and I believe his players feel this."
He would never say so and he would surely contest the idea, but Mike Russo is men's soccer at Williams and he will be for a long, long time.
Tags: soccer,
