Written by Isaac Strand
The Concordia University Chicago (CUC) men’s soccer team reached conference playoffs for the first time in program history this past season, led by head coach Michael Arango. In his third year as the head coach of the men’s soccer team, he took the program to new heights, finishing the season 9-9 overall, with a 6-5 conference record and a playoff berth. However, as Arango says himself that the journey for this feat began long before this season.
Arango began coaching soccer for his brother’s team, when his team was looking for someone to help coaching and his love of the game of soccer took over from there. He then worked as the director of coaching for Campton United Soccer Club, creating a club curriculum, leading to multiple state titles and joining one of the best leagues in the country. Then he took over as director of coaching for the Wilmette Wings Soccer Club, responsible for the U8 to U14 club teams. Since 2004, Arango has been involved with the Illinois Youth Soccer Association (IYSA), as part of the Coaching Education staff, as well as with the Olympic Development Program. However, Arango admitted that while being involved with these great organizations, coaching at the collegiate level was always on his mind as a possibility.
Arango began his college coaching career at CUC, where he graduated with his master’s degree. He began as an assistant for the women’s soccer team in 2015. With the women’s soccer team, Arango helped create training programs for the players, as well as completing post-season player evaluations and helped with recruiting. From this experience, the biggest thing he took away was “just understanding what a collegiate athlete is, and how their needs are different from any club player.” He also realized that coaching at the college level was “a lot more than the X’s and O’s, it’s the academics, the well-being, almost everything but the actual soccer.” Despite doing the “dirty work” as an assistant back in 2015, Arango proudly claimed that he still does all of that now with the men’s soccer team as their head coach.
Arango took over the men’s soccer team in 2017, and faced an uphill battle, winning only three games in both of his first two seasons at the helm. However, despite the lack of success at first glance, Arango was building a culture for his team, specifically away from the field. Arango always believed that if his players could take care of everything away from soccer, such as their well-being and academics, for 90 minutes, they could play stress free and only worry about the game at hand. With this idea in hand, he has witnessed many “firsts” for the program, starting back in 2017 when the Concordia University Chicago Cougars beat the Dominican University Stars for the first time in program history. Then he took his team up to Evanston to face Northwestern University, the first time CUC soccer ever played a Division I team.
Most recently, CUC men’s soccer clinched a conference playoff berth for the first time in program history, which Arango admits this past season has been his favorite because “the guys who have come together in terms of culture… and on top of that, the alumni that I coached two years ago are coming back to watch and support the squad, so I got guys that believe in the program and come out to support, and the young guys who are seeing these older guys. It’s fun.”
This season was successful both as a team and individually for the Cougars, who not only made conference playoffs, but had three players receive postseason recognition. Senior goaltender Jose Retana was named second team All-NACC, while freshmen Alexis Gallegos and Juan Valencia were both honorable mention All-NACC. About their recent success, Arango stated, “they did the things off the field that helped build character and build success on the field. When you come into games not stressed about anything else and you’re able to focus on what you need to focus on, it makes it easy for that 90 minutes to do what you have to do.”
Arango and his squad look to carry momentum in the conference into the offseason and eventually into next season, but he has other goals he wants his team to accomplish first, saying, “the first thing we’re all looking to do is have the highest team GPA on campus… on the field, we know conference isn’t an automatic next year, so our challenge going into next year is to repeat a conference berth.”
The Cougars, despite losing Retana, will return most of their major contributors next season, including junior captain Bryce Bilodeau and All-NACC freshmen Valencia and Gallegos. Arango is excited to see who else steps up in the offseason, saying, “whoever wants to step up can step up, obviously we have a great leader in Bryce [Bilodeau], who is going to be our senior captain, and we’ll see who else wants to be a part of that.” After making playoffs this season, an important offseason is ahead of the Cougars, who are looking to continue to grow and make the next step, both on and off the field.
