Wolves Looking To Build From Historic Season

WESSON - The Co-Lin Men's Soccer team is coming off a 2022 season that saw the team create multiple moments of program history. The Wolves finished with the best record in program history at 10-3-3, were ranked for the first time ever, and topped it all off with their first postseason appearance in program history. Co-Lin head coach Tom Cosgrave said he's excited about the potential for the upcoming season.

"We are excited about getting the guys on campus and in preseason camp to get them ready for this season," stated Cosgrave. "The good thing about our men's team is that a lot of them have been playing summer league ball together and we believe they are going to come in quite fit and match ready from the fact that many of their teams had deep runs throughout the summer."

The 2023 squad features 24 players with 11 returning sophomores and 13 incoming freshmen.

"We have a lot of good players coming in this season and I think this team has the potential to be one of if not the most talented teams we have had since starting the soccer program back," added Cosgrave. "We are looking forward to the challenge of conference play and hoping that we can get further than we did last year in postseason play."

The 11 sophomores include Leo Summers (Cornwall, England), Dylan Ngamaleu (Vallorbe, Switzerland), John Hrivnak (Madison), Alfie Lally (Manchester, England), Tripp Donald (Flowood), Cooper Madison (Vicksburg), Caden McCullough (Byram), Daniel Stack (Madison), Benji Hernandez (Richland), Park Smith (Cleveland) and Yosvin Ramirez (Bogue Chitto). "The good thing is that this group of returners have three of our international players that played significant time for us and many of the local players saw significant time throughout the season also," stated Cosgrave. "These guys are going to be key members on the pitch for us but will also be valuable from a leadership side as they know what it takes to make a good run in the playoffs and not peaking too early in the season."

"I think our success will come down to our standards and depending on our guys like Leo Summers and Alfie Lally to hold all the players to meeting those," added Cosgrave. "We want to make sure that all of our guys are here for the right reasons and that we are upholding our standards at all times during games and practices."

"We want everyone to come in and be ready to compete. I think our freshmen will learn early on that our practices at times might be more competitive than games because everyone is competing for spots and playing time," said Cosgrave. "We want to bring that intensity in practice and let it translate over into our games in order to provide a more realistic environment."

"The schedule for the men is similar to the women's schedule in that we're playing teams that we have not played before," said Cosgrave. "That adds a new challenge to the season because you have to play opponents that you're going in blind against because we don't have scouting reports or things like that on them, but playing these teams will give us some adversity that will better prepare us for conference play and then hopefully a deep run in the postseason."

The Wolves open the season on the road against East Central College on Friday, August 25, in Memphis, Tennessee.