Dear WNY Soccer Families,
As we look to begin our 10th year at Empire, it seemed like a good time to step back and reflect on the season. In case you were unaware, the Buffalo area has humble soccer beginnings. Dating back fifteen years ago, we had no real formal soccer club serving top players. There were "premier" clubs, but they were really a collection of teams using a club id. Our players were not well respected in the state and had few opportunities outside our area. Our teams were the "good" draw if you ran up against us in state or regional events. The vision for Empire was to try and pull all of the scarce player and coach resources together so we could field a competitive team and then begin expanding and developing on those resources so we had more players and coaches succeeding at state, regional, and national levels.
Well change takes time, like anything worthwhile. We certainly have a long way to go before any of us believe we are done (likely never), but let's take stock of where we are today.
Empire Buffalo …
- Had the most teams qualify for State Cup Final Four weekend than any other club in the state.
- Had more State Cup wins than any other club in the state. Take a look at the history of cup champions on the NYSWYSA.org website. There are many years where Buffalo had no winners at all and at the most we've had three. This year we had four. You'll also notice there were clubs in the past from Rochester and Syracuse that dominated the cups, but the climate is so competitive now, there is a larger variety of winners.
- Had the most teams of any club in the state competing in the Region 1 leagues, with a handful of our teams advancing to the league playoffs.
- Had two teams competing in the USYSA National League in the last two seasons.
- Boasts a coaching staff that has expanded to in size (over 50) and quality, including many new young coaches who played in our program as youth players.
- Has an expanding house league program with over 250 kids served in our first season
- Has a summer camp program that will likely double in size from its first season (summer 2013)
- Has programming starting at 6 and teams starting at 8. Not too long ago we were combining age groups to form u11 teams.
- Has a WPSL Women’s team, which started in 2013 with great success and continues to evolve
- Has partnered with FC Buffalo to field an FC Buffalo reserve team that is off and running
The lesser known and most amazing part of this run is that all of this team success has occurred despite the fact that we have pushed about 25 to 30 of our best players on to either the Development Academy or the Girls State Academy. This year’s u16 boys Development Academy team was half Buffalo kids.
As the ONLY program in NYSW associated with the US Soccer Development Academy, we have strong regional and national brand recognition and a direct link to our national program. For most programs, the club level is the top of its pyramid, for Empire, the soccer pyramid (aka opportunities) goes all the way up to the MLS and US Soccer exposure. Essentially, there is no ceiling for our players.
By no means are we done or comfortable with what we’ve achieved. Improvements are in the works for our 10th season and we are excited about the opportunities for our players. We look forward to seeing everyone at tryouts.
www.EmpireUSA-Buf.org/tryouts
