Santa Cruz Soccer Man
Earl Coutant introduced today's speaker Paolo Carbone. Paolo is one of the hubs of the youth and collegiate soccer scenes in the Santa Cruz area. Among other roles, he is head coach for the men's and women's teams at Cabrillo; coaching director for the nationally recognized Santa Cruz Breakers Youth Soccer League, and founding organizer of the Breakers National Premier Soccer League team - a showcase semi-pro team consisting of youth, collegiate and post-collegiate players.
Paolo was born in France where he played soccer professionally. After marrying his Santa Cruz native wife and realizing his passion is to coach soccer, in the late '90's he migrated to SC and set up shop.
Since championing soccer here, he's had a tremendous effect on the scene. E.g., the Cabrillo Men's and Woman's teams have risen to national ranking (the men were #6 nationally in '06); the Breakers Class I club is perennially recognized as a N. California powerhouse; and, the Breakers Academy is one of only 4 US National Soccer Federation sanctioned feeders is CA for the US World Cup Team.
According to Carbone, the Santa Cruz area in particularly rich is excellent soccer talent. His ambition is to provide venues and elite coaching to help as many players as possible get to the collegiate level and beyond, to fully realize their potential.
Paolo also spoke a bit about the history of soccer "in the states". The MLS was formed in 1996 and to many Europeans, "saved America!" Currently there are 3.2 million registered soccer players in the US, more than both football and baseball. There are 250,000 players in N. Cal and 4,600 in Santa Cruz County - consisting of about 2,000 adults and more that 1,000 year-round players. Carbone thinks it's only a matter of time before the new generation of soccer playing youth grow older and soccer will takes it's place among other prestige sports in the US as a first class spectators sport.
He invites everyone to come by Cabrillo just about any evening to see some fantastic soccer played by the Cabrillo and Breakers teams.
Resources:
Cabrillo Soccer: www.cabrillo.edu/academics/athletics/soccer
Breakers Youth Soccer League: www.SCCsoccer.org
Breakers National Premier Team: www.SCCsoccer.org/NPSL