BY SPENCER VAN DER WEELE
Hello everyone! Welcome to Indiana High School Boys Soccer! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Spencer Van Der Weele. I am an Argos High School Soccer alum and current assistant boys soccer coach for the Dragons. I am a soccer fanatic and a huge fan of Indiana University Men’s Soccer and Manchester United F.C.
Ever since my playing days, I have always kept up on high school soccer. Much more when I began coaching. The more I read and watched from writers and reporters, I realized the severe lack of acknowledgement and understanding of the 30 years of high school soccer that came prior to the Indiana High School Athletic Association taking over in 1994. Programs like Argos, Carmel, and Evansville Memorial (Just to name a few), have won multiple state championships in that era. The struggles that players, coaches, administrators, and programs faced before the IHSAA sanctioning has shaped the way the game is today. Although the IHSAA has helped organize and publicize the game, you ask anyone who was involved with soccer during the early days, those state championships mean just as much as the IHSAA championships today.
My goal is to provide a comprehensive collection of records and history that include both pre-IHSAA and IHSAA eras, to make sure that history prior to the IHSAA involvement is celebrated and not forgotten. Along with the preservation of this history and achievements, these records will be used to promote and highlight today’s players, coaches, and programs all over the state.
I am still collecting records and statistics to complete the record book. I encourage coaches to send their program’s records along with any questions you may have to insoccerrecords@gmail.com or direct message our Twitter account, @inhssoccer. I will continue to reach out to coaches and programs that I still need records from. I invite players, coaches, and fans of Indiana high school boys soccer to share and visit our site! I look forward to learning and sharing the records, history, and achievements of high school boys soccer programs all across Indiana!