Noonan’s Tigers Have An Eye On History

Mike Noonan has a keen sense of history.

Growing up, Noonan recalls the place in men’s soccer lore Clemson University held. National championships in 1984 and 1987, 13 Atlantic Cost Conference championships, seven Final Fours — the list of accomplishments and the all-time greats who rolled through the program rank with the nation’s most storied schools.

As a player and as a coach, Noonan created history. He was a two-time First-Team All-American player at Middlebury before he worked as an assistant coach at Vermont and at Bates. He then was hired to start a men’s soccer program at Wheaton College, where he spent two seasons and went from a 4-11 record to a 12-5-1 finish.

Noonan then spent four seasons as coach at New Hampshire. Noonan’s biggest success as a coach came at Brown. In 15 years, Noonan led the Bears to the NCAA tournament 10 times and won eight Ivy League titles. He had 10 seasons with 10 or more victories and only one losing season.

But all of that history pales in comparison to what has happened at Clemson.

Still, even the best programs sometime need a spark. That’s why Noonan was hired to begin the reconstruction project of a program that hasn’t advanced to the NCAAs since 2006. Since then, Clemson has had two coaches, has suffered through five losing seasons and one .500 finish.

This year, though, the Tigers have shown signs of recapturing the form of their forefathers.

[show_disconnected][show_to accesslevel=’Subscriber’] Through games played in mid-October, Clemson is 8-3-2 and 3-2-2 in the ACC. Ranked #9, Clemson lost to #22 Furman 2-1 on Oct. 15.

The Tigers defeated Pitt, 2-0, on Oct. 18, designated as Men’s Soccer Reunion Night. Numerous former players attended, many seeing facility improvements for the first time.

“The most important thing is to get good players and to have good character within the group of players you have,” Noonan said. “The support of the administration has been fantastic. Everyone has put their oars in the water and has wanted to start pulling in the same direction.”

Noonan doesn’t use the word rebuild. He prefers the term “reconstruction” because he feels he, his coaches, and his players are breathing life back into a program that is capable of much more.

His approach has focused on re-connecting with former players and bringing everyone — regardless of which team or coach they played for — together under the Clemson soccer umbrella.

Noonan also has taught his players to respect the Tigers tradition and to understand what it means to play soccer at Clemson.

“When you’re doing anything like this, you want to build something that is going to last,” Noonan said. “You can’t do that overnight. I think the way we made decisions and went about how things had to be was a little outside the box.”

Following three-straight losing seasons, Trevor Adair resigned in June 2009. Clemson assistant coach Phil Hindson was named interim coach for the 2009 season and guided the team to a 6-12-1 (2-6 ACC) finish.

Enter Noonan, who was named coach Jan. 5, 2010. He said the lack of success made it challenging to convince players to come back to Clemson. He also was surprised at the state of the program when he arrived and immediately began to re-engage the alumni to use their gravitas to help restore the luster to Clemson men’s soccer.

“I can’t talk enough about the administrative support,” Noonan said. “The locker rooms have been restored, the renovations on the stadium have made into one of the nicest in the country. Telling the Clemson story and living it and showing it to people creates a sense of belief that it can happen here. That is something the players bought into. We’re still not anywhere near where we need to be.”

Clemson has players from 12 states in the U.S. and from Brazil, Bermuda, France, and England. The plan to find the best possible talent and the right fits to the program is similar to the one Noonan used at Brown.

Graduate student Thomas McNamara, who was named ACC Player of the Week earlier this month, played for Noonan as a freshman at Brown. He tied for the team lead with five goals — all game-winners — as a freshman.

He was named Second-Team All-Ivy League in 2010 before an injury cut short his 2011 season four games in.

With another year of eligibility, McNamara looked for a place to play and found his former coach restoring the magic at Clemson. Through the first eight Clemson games, he has scored six goals, tied for team best.”

“He definitely took some of the aspects at Brown to be successful and brought them along to Clemson,” McNamara said. “He is willing to do whatever it takes for us to be successful. To see a leader and a head coach putting in a ton of work sets the example of how things are done.

“If you want to be good, it takes hard work to be good. That trickles down from the coach and feeds through the system. We see his example and try to emulate his example to put in the hours to be successful.”

Noonan admits he didn’t know what to expect when he took over the program. He said he and his assistants have offered plenty of praise and exercised patience to form the framework of new players for a reconstructed Clemson.

The soccer program also is getting assistance from the school administration in its efforts to reach out and bring the former players back into the fold. Noonan expects 70-80 people back to celebrate alumni weekend.

“A lot has happened, not just what I have done or the players have done,” Noonan said. “It is a group effort.

“The results will come to us. It is energy, attitude, and effort, but the talent level is 20-fold what it was when we first got here. We have some very, very good players here. We want to build something that is going to last and that tradition is never going to get old.

“We want to add a third national championship and another ACC championship. We also want to produce outstanding young men who are going to contribute to society and in the next level of the game. We work toward those things every day.”