Ida's Tim Allen named Region Boys Soccer Coach of the Year

Ida’s soccer team was looking forward to the challenge.

The Blue Streaks needed the challenge.

Coach Tim Allen’s team has made steady progress since launching a varsity boys soccer team five years ago.

The Blue Streaks have become very good on their own level.

The question was – how would they fare against the best teams in the state?

That’s why the finals of the Division 3 District at Milan were so important to Ida.

Allen’s squad was scheduled to play a Grosse Ile team that has played in the state finals in each past four seasons, winning two championships.

“Obviously, we can’t control what games we play in our league,” Allen said. “We like playing teams like Bedford and Grosse Ile. The physicality of those teams is greater than what we are used to.”

Ida couldn’t stop Grosse Ile.

The Red Devils rolled to another berth in the state finals, making it to the championship game before falling 2-0 to Grand Rapids South Christian.

Ida’s season ended with a 4-2 loss to Grosse Ile, but Allen said he learned a lot about his squad in that contest.

“I told the guys that we can pretty much play with anybody,” Allen said. “We just have to prove it to ourselves. If we keep working, good things will happen.”

That was the theme of the season for Ida, which tied a school record for wins in a season in going 16-3 and earned a share of the Lenawee County Athletic Association championship for the second time in school history.

Those accomplishments have led to Allen being named Monroe County Region Boys Soccer Coach of the Year in voting by The Monroe News sports staff.

Allen felt the game against Grosse Ile was the biggest measuring stick of the season.

“I feel like we had a pretty good sense of accomplishment,” Allen said. “We were the only team to score against them (except South Christian) in the state tournament.”

The Blue Streaks gave up what Allen considered a pair of soft goals early then fought back to pull within 2-1 at the half. The same script played out in the second half as Grosse Ile struck for a pair of early goals before Ida could answer.

“I was very proud of our guys,” Allen said. “We came out and were down right away, but they kept playing. … We did some things wrong, but they were able to adjust and move forward. It’s hard not to make mistakes playing at that level.”

Playing Grosse Ile gave the Ida coaches and players a sense of what they need to accomplish next.

Allen has noticed steady improvement in the team’s level of play over the past five years.

“We’ve done really well,” he said. “Each year the players come in more and more skilled. We have a better basis to work with in practice. The gap between our first player and our 20th is not as big.”

Evan Schmitz, who has been the program’s best player over its early history, will be lost to graduation along with fellow seniors Dillon and Dustin Holycross and Connor Ramsey.

Those four will be tough to replace but enthusiasm in the team remains strong.

“It was challenging the first couple of years,” Allen said. “We barely had enough guys. This year we had 24 and only four were seniors.

“Next year will be a new challenge. We have eight or nine new kids coming out for the team and I think you can only have 24. At some point, we’ll have to think about a JV team.”

Allen says assistants Kevin Czajkowski, Mike Bolster and Eddie Mannor have been invaluable to him in building Ida’s program.

“They make it so much easier,” Allen said. “When you have 24 guys, you can’t give all of them enough attention. When there are four of us, we can divide them up.”

And the players always seem hungry for more information.

“I’ve really been blessed with a great bunch of kids,” Allen said. “We had 24 players and 21 of them either had a goal or an assist. We are proud of that.”

This article originally appeared on The Monroe News: Ida's Tim Allen named Region Boys Soccer Coach of the Year