Most of you reading this will, no doubt, be aware of the news that Coach Mike Noonan, leader of the Brown Men's Soccer team for the past fourteen seasons, has recently departed for Clemson, South Carolina.
Starting with the 1995 season, Mike brought immediate success with his winning mentality, knowledge of the game, and unmatched work ethic and attention to detail. The title of Coach Rick Pitino's autobiography "Success Is A Choice" comes to mind when you assess Coach Noonan's work habits as head coach of the Bears, as he put in hours and hours of his personal energy to ensure that Brown Soccer sustained a history of excellence during his tenure. Noonan established himself as one of the nation's brightest soccer minds in his fifteen years on college hill, and we are sure that Clemson will benefit from his presence on campus.
As has been emphasized throughout the process of hiring of his replacement, Brown Soccer is a sustainable entity that will move on, whomever is at the helm of the program. With that, we welcome another outstanding soccer mind to Providence in the form of Pat Laughlin, a man familiar to many of us, as he takes the reigns from "within," having been an assistant coach with the team in the recent outstanding 2009 season.
Coach Laughlin has already started the process of sustaining the tradition of excellence for Brown Men's Soccer. The players are engaged and lively, and the 2010 recruiting class have all re-affirmed their commitment to the university and the program. The Spring season begins shortly with visits from Boston College (April 16th) and Providence College (April 14th) just around the corner.
Before coming to Brown, Laughlin served as head coach at his alma-mata, the University of Maine, where he turned around a perennially losing program in quite remarkable fashion during 2007 and 2008. Prior to his tenure at Maine, Laughlin was an integral member of staff on the 2006 Atlantic-10 championship-winning Rhode Island Rams squad. For a more detailed biography on our new coach visit www.brownbears.com.
April 24th is Spring weekend at Brown. Crammed in to the festivities of that weekend will be penultimate soccer-event of our Spring season, the annual alumni game. Recently-graduated players (who are still in shape hopefully!) will put the current squad to the test in a highly contested contest at the Berylson Family Field complex. Revenge is on the minds of the current squad, who suffered a 2-1 reverse in April 2009!
For those alums who are visiting campus on that weekend and are confident/healthy enough to participate, we look forward to a great game. To ensure that we have knowledge of your attendance please contact me at gregg_miller@brown.edu.
