Daviess County’s boys’ soccer head coach Doug Sandfer was awarded the 3rd Region Coach of the Year award. Sandifer led the Panthers to their tenth consecutive district and regional titles in a row along with a 21-5-1 record for the season. They also made their 9th appearance in the Elite Eight of the state tournament in the last 10 years.
Sandifer has been coaching 31 years, and has been Daviess County’s head coach for 29 years now. Before his coaching career, Sandifer played in high school at OHS before going on to play as a defender at KWC. Throughout the Panthers ten-year reign as champions, Sandifer has led different teams with different talents all with the same goal in mind. Sandifer said that the players are aware of the high expectations, but it’s up to them to buy into the system.
“We’re consistent in the things we’re trying to teach kids from season to season as far as the style of play that we want and emphasizing certain things we need to do well,” he said. “Those things don’t really change from year-to-year, but we’ve been very fortunate. We’ve had a long run of talented players that realize we have high expectations, and then they come in here and buy into what we’re doing.”
This year’s squad was highlighted by the mixture of younger and older players sprinkled throughout the team as well as their effort in every single game, Sanidfer said. The team’s success this year stemmed from the multiple leaders within the squad, he said.
“Sam was a good leader, Connor was a nice vocal leader in the back, and Jack and Lukas played with a lot of effort and the others fed off of that,” he said. “I think that’s what helped the team be successful was more than one kid stepped and led in their own way. It doesn’t always have to be vocal, but you need a mix of vocal leaders and guys that lead by example in how they play. I think we had a good mix of both of those, and the younger kids followed their example.”
Another reason for the team’s success lies in the team playing in some form nine months out of the year. A lot of the team play on travel teams and at Sports Tutor during the Winter, he said.
“Our kids stay involved after the fall season,” he said. “A lot of them do Sports Tutor in the Winter then go into club season usually the first of March if not early, then they take a little break in June and start back up with the high school season. Most of ours, if they’re not playing another sport, are playing some version of soccer nine months out of the year.”
Sandifer himself has coached in club soccer at Owensboro United for about the last twenty years. This year is the first time he will not be coaching in the Spring for the club, however. Since his kids finished playing, Sanidfer felt that now would be a good time to take a break and enjoy a Spring without traveling.
Sandifer has been coaching 31 years and has been Daviess County’s head coach for 29 years now. Before his coaching career, Sandifer played in high school at OHS before going on to play as a defender at KWC.
