By: Caleb Kammerer, Sports Writer
WAVERLY – The fall sports season is upon us, and the Wartburg men’s soccer team is ready to compete. After winning the American Rivers Conference tournament and hosting the first round of NCAA Division III action, head coach Mike Madigan and his team are looking for more improvements.
“We’ve had a bit of turnover but we’re really excited about the group that’s returned and where our culture is at,” Madigan said. “The biggest is the continued growth of our culture and to have success across everything that we do.”
After a season where the Knights had a record of 12-2-6, Wartburg steamrolled their way through the A-R-C tournament to an at-large bid and hosted the first round of the NCAA tournament. This was due to a stifling defense led by defensive MVP Brennan Woody, who led the nation in shutouts last year.
But Woody has graduated, leading to new goalies battling to anchor Wartburg’s defense. 5th-year captain Curtis Ratzer spoke of Woody’s importance, but also the work that the rest of the team and goalies have done to prepare.
“Defense is one of our cornerstones as a program,” Ratzer said. “And that’s why we’re really excited for the upcoming freshman class and the guys that were in sub[stitute] positions last year that have a chance to start and be on the field.”
Madigan echoed Ratzer’s sentiments, citing the goalkeeper position battle as a positive.
“It’s competitive, in a really good way,” Madigan said. “Whether it’s Kaden Baxter coming back as a junior or our two first-years Caleb Cross and Henry Eckert coming in, they have a competitive position group and we have seen some really good performances in exhibitions.”
With all of the excitement about the defense, with a new goalkeeper for the first time since Woody was a freshman, there should also be some excitement about the offense as well. Second-year Alima Mmunga who was tied for third in goals with three (the only returner with more goals was Ratzer with six), is excited for the offense on this team.
“We have brought in a lot of new guys,” Mmunga said. “But we are a very competitive team and they bring out the energy. We’re going to look really good, with a lot more goals being scored this year.”
And with the possible progressions, Wartburg received love within the A-R-C preseason poll, as they were tabbed to finish second in the conference behind Loras. Wartburg and Loras were the only two teams to receive first place votes, but Madigan is not concerned with that.
“It’s a good thing when you approach each day the same and that you want to get better each and every day,” Madigan said. “You want to keep making progress. If you show up to our games, it says ‘progress never stops’ on our warmup shirts. So it’s continuing to build on where we are at, and those things [ranking high in coaches’ polls] are nice to see, but they don’t mean a whole lot right now.”
Wartburg will open their season against Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota on August 30th at 5 p.m.
Once the season starts, Wartburg’s men’s soccer team will continue to improve, because progress never stops.
Click here to watch Coach Madigan’s interview at Fall Sports Media Day.
