By Ronak Patel
New women's soccer head coach Brendan Lawler has been on the job for a little over two months.
Despite the short timeframe he's had to work with, Lawler has kept busy in preparing for his first college head coaching job. Lawler came on board in mid-June. Prior to Manhattan College, Lawler was an assistant at Marist College for two seasons. The Newburgh, N.Y., native also coaches a U18 team in the Lower Hudson Valley and works for Next Level Soccer, a venture that focuses on personal training for goalkeepers.
"We've done a whole lot in a short period of time," said Lawler, who's quite familiar with the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, having also been a goalkeeper at Saint Peter's College. "There been a whole lot of phone calls, meeting the players, meeting the administration and hitting the ground running as fast as I could with the season a short time away."
The Lady Jaspers begin the season at home on August 27 against Farleigh Dickinson University. They went 8-9-3 last season under then-head coach Sean Driscoll. The Lady Jaspers have had plenty success in recent years, winning 40 games in five years and winning key games against schools from big conferences (Big East and Atlantic 10). Under Driscoll's guidance, the program placed 15 players on the All-MAAC team.
"Being young and eager, I wanted the opportunity to take over for coach (Sean Driscoll)," Lawler said. "He's done a very good job here; I have a great ton of respect for Sean and everything he's done at Manhattan.
"His teams always played everybody hard in the conference, and I know there was a great foundation he left here."
A big aide in Lawler's transition has been senior captain midfielder/backer Kara Bucci, a fellow Newburgh native.
"She's been my guide through Manhattan soccer," said Lawler. "She's been great."
One thing that's sure to continue and prosper under Lawler is the academic success of the Lady Jaspers. The team has registered 51 MAAC All-Academic Team honorees the past five years. Lawler, who graduated cum laude from Saint Peter's, was a teacher at Pine Bush High School before joining the coaching ranks.
"This program is solid and has been heading in the right direction for years," he said. "There's a strong academic background here at Manhattan. You know what you're getting into with the academics first and knowing the classroom is the most important.
"I felt everything was in place here coming into a new job and it has been definitely smoother because of the strong academic background."
In 2006, Lawler took a leave of absence from his teaching post to get a master's degree in political science and while on sabbatical, he took a coaching position with Army. From there, he quickly climbed the college ranks.
"Coaching soccer was something I always wanted to do," said Lawler. "I always had a drive to constantly coach and when I was a full-time teacher, I obviously didn't have the time to be a full-time college coach.
"I took the risk to leave teaching when I got a coaching job at Army and at that time (it was five years ago), I was young, I was unconnected and it was a risk I took. I said to myself 'I can always go back to teaching if this didn't pan out.'"
In three years at Army under former men's head coach Kurt Swanbeck, Lawler, who trained goalkeepers and spearheaded the defensive side, got vital coaching experience and was part of the program's turnaround.
"I put in many hours in the office getting to know everything I could about the college game," said Lawler. "This included play on the field at the collegiate level and doing my coaching licenses; I was doing everything I could do to hopefully make myself a viable candidate.
"I learned a lot from the great coaches that I coached underneath at West Point and Marist because coaching at the college level is so much more than soccer. It's obvious it's the love that brings us all out there, but it's trying to mentor 25 to 30 young men and women through the Division I process - you want them to do great in school and set them up for a career after soccer."
To that end, Lawler hired Alicia Tirelli as his assistant. Tirelli was a standout at Florida Atlantic University and currently plays for the Hudson Valley Quickstrike in the USL W-League. Lawler believes Tirelli's example will prove valuable to the current players. Tirelli coached one season at her alma mater in 2008, where she helped the Owls advance to the Sun Belt Conference semifinals.
"(Alicia) is a fantastic player and will lead by example," said Lawler. "She will be able to show the players on our team what it takes to have a very successful D-I career, graduate with a degree that allows you to be successful at life and still pursue your dreams.
"She's only one step away from the highest level of professional soccer in the United States for women. She will be on the field with us everyday, improving them tactically and mentally to get the job done; I'm going to rely on her to develop players."
With the season fast approaching, Lawler is looking at the bigger picture.
"I have found that the college game is so condensed playing, basically 20 games in a nine-week period," said Lawler. "So much of it is about injuries and making sure everyone is on the same page, and breaks that you never know which way they are going to go.
"My expectations are everyone will put in 100 percent everyday mentally and physically; if we do that, we will have a chance to compete in every single game. The MAAC has a really good competitive balance where games are always tight; if we have that mental edge, then we will have the confidence to be competitive at the end of the year."
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