Marquette Tribune, October 29, 2015, Vol. 100, No. 8, p. 13

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Marquette Tribune, October 29, 2015, Vol. 100, No. 8, p. 13

2015-10-29

Thursday, Octo ber 29, 2015 Tribune 13 S ports There was a time in Nick Vorberg’s life when he thought he might spend the rest of it in San Diego. He was on his third pro­fessional indoor soccer team, in five years, but thought that might be where he would stick. A year later, in 2002, he was traded to the Milwau­kee Wave, where he has been settled ever since. Settled is a loose term in Vor­berg’s case. He’s a father of three, a part-time coach for both Marquette soccer teams, the acad­emy director for SC Waukesha, a premier club academy just outside of Milwaukee, and, at age 40, is a goalkeeper and coach for the Major Arena Soccer League’s Milwaukee Wave. “He’s like superman,” said Mar­quette men’s coach Louis Bennett. “He just keeps grabbing different hats, taking different clothes off and then he’s good.” Bennett first courted Vorberg in Summer 2012, in need of a volunteer assistant to work spe­cifically with the goalkeepers. Vorberg began working with the team’s keepers, particularly new starter and then-redshirt sopho­more Charlie Lyon. Lyon went on to post a 0.78 goals against average en route to a 16-4-1 re­cord that season. The follow­ing summer, Vorberg joined the women’s coaching staff in a similar role. “His first year was kind of an adjustment period because you could tell he was just kind of watching and didn’t want to step over any boundaries,” said women’s senior keeper Amanda Engel, who has been the starter since Vorberg’s arrival in 2013. “He has definitely stepped past that boundary by now. I know that if I ever have a question about something I can always go to him and he will give me a 100 percent honest answer no matter how Vorberg’s mark on MU soccer Pro keeper gives time, expertise to four different teams By Dan Reiner [email protected] Nick Vorberg, 40, is learning to balance his time as a father, a coach at Marquette, a youth soccer academy director and a professional goalkeeper. Photo by Ben Erickson/[email protected] much I don’t want to hear it.” “Nick delivers his brutal hones­ty on a very soft pillow,” Bennett agreed. “It’s going to hit you one way or another.” Engel said Vorberg tends to fo­cus on the individual rather than multiple players at once during practice. When it’s her turn in net, his eyes are on Engel while fresh­man keeper Sloane Carlson takes mental notes, and vice-versa. “I’m just maintaining and do­ing the technical work,” Vor­berg said. “I’m talking to the coaches about what I saw happen in games and how they can imple­ment that into practices.” The coaches and players wel­come Vorberg’s advice with open arms because of his indoor soc­cer background. Playing on a smaller field with fewer players, the goalie is more involved in the offense but still needs reactionary skills in goal. “It’s phonetic, fast, fu­rious, lots of action, lots of screaming, lots of yelling, mu­sic, lights… and he’s calm,” Ben­nett said, a former professional indoor player himself. Bennett said part of the rea­son the team recruited freshman keeper Wicho Barraza was be­cause of his footwork and aggres­siveness on the field, which have only improved since arriving to work with Vorberg. “The way the outdoor game is transitioning, goalies have to be good with their feet,” Vorberg said. “If you watch Wicho and Amanda, they’re very good with their feet. Wicho could get a ball in the box and drop it on a dime well past half field.” With the women’s side los­ing Engel to graduation after this year, both the men’s and women’s teams will likely have sophomore starting keepers next season. Still, Vorberg is confident that the young netminders have got­ten unrivaled experience thus far under his wing. “What’s nice is there’s a blue­print with Amanda, as there was with Charlie Lyon,” he said. “Sloane is getting a great taste right now with Amanda. She’s got a lot to work on and there are things you take a closer look at…Every goalie is different, just like every player is different. You just have to focus on what their strengths and weaknesses are and keep building on them.” Vorberg takes these lessons into account when working with SC Waukesha. “What I’m interested in is the transition from club to college and figuring out what kind of col­lege player makes a pro,” he said. “From the girls side, I have my foot in the water and can ask my­self, ‘Which girls actually have an opportunity to make an impact at the DI level?’ That’s fun for me.” Now at the tail end of his play­ing career, Vorberg is learning to make adjustments to the per­sonal and professional aspects of his life. The former U.S. futsal national team goalie and Pacific University Hall of Famer wants to keep his family in Milwaukee. It’s just a matter of which hat he wants to put on that day. “I feel that if I’m in an envi­ronment where I feel like I’m learning and I’m a part of it, and that I can contribute and it’s giving back both ways, that’s where I want to be,” he said. “It’s been that way here.” Marquette Wire staff writer Jack Goods contributed to this report. Club softball is in the midst of one of its most successful seasons so far, standing at 6-0 after its first two series. In the club’s last three-game series against Loyola University-Chicago, Marquette won by a combined score of 47-2. Junior Vice President Callie Troufetter sees the team’s depth as one of its greatest strengths. “We can put really anyone any­where,” Troutfetter said. “We’ve played with random lineups, putting people where they’ve never played before, and noth­ing has ever cost us from it. Club softball dominating early schedule Powerful offense has scored 47 runs in last 3 games By Robby Cowles [email protected] Everyone’s got a great attitude and loves the sport.” Following a solid 12-3 season last year, Marquette is on pace to surpass that mark. Junior presi­dent Erin Wilson believes this team’s pitching talent far surpass­es that of previous seasons. “We have three or four pitchers this year. Usually we have, like, one-ish,” Wilson said. “They’re all good pitchers, so going into the season, I knew it was go­ing to be a really good season because we were several players deep at each position.” The two team leaders raved most about Megan Socha, a freshman from Minnetonka, Minnesota. The team has won all three of her starts. “Megan’s an awesome pitch­er and she was one of the most surprising ones because she was so quiet and serious in the beginning,” Wilson said. “But now she’s more comfortable be­cause she’s really proven that she’s a great player.” Socha was ad­mittedly intimi­dated at first, playing against girls a few years older, but was able to settle in quickly. “The first game I felt more comfortable, just because a lot of the girls are very encouraging,” Socha said. “I’ll be pitching and they’ll be cheering for me and you kind of feel like part of the team and feel like you can be a leader, and step up with their guidance.” Troutfetter, another of the club’s pitchers, sees this team’s toughness as a factor for its success so far. “Everyone’s more out for the kill this year,” she said. “There’s more cutthroat competitors on the team.” One of the play­ers that Wilson, Troutfetter and Socha all men­tioned as having a great year is soph­omore Allie Arn­ston. The slugger hit three home runs in their last se­ries against Loyola, blowing both the ball and her teammates away. “Allie just proves time and time again that she really deserves to be in the core of the batting line­up,” Wilson said. “She hit three home runs, and they weren’t just like regular home runs, they were way gone.” Arnston, though, credited her strong play to the bond she has with her teammates. She says the atmosphere on the field and in the dugout are what makes her feel comfortable at the plate. “We’re just a really close-knit group of girls,” Arnston said. “We became really close re­ally fast, and the dynamic is just great on the field.” Marquette will need to have all of those pieces working when it hosts a series with University of Wisconsin-Whitewater at Wil­son Park beginning Nov. 7. Both teams are currently 6-0, and knotted in a three-way tie with UW-Madison in the National Club Softball Association’s Great Lakes-West Division. There’s more cutthroat competitors on the team.” Callie Troufetter Junior Club Softball Vice President

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