He was the heart and soul of the team,” Matt Dennis said. “We’re going to miss him.”
The Seymour High School boys soccer coach was raving about Cameron Cox, a senior member of the team.
After Dennis made those comments, he presented the most valuable player award to Cox during the team’s awards program Monday night in the school cafeteria.
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Cox took home an armload of plaques and honors, including being the recipient of the Indiana Soccer Coaches Association top team player award.
Cox also was one of 11 Owls named to the association’s academic all-state team, was named all-Hoosier Hills Conference and received Seymour’s outstanding midfielder award.
A pleased and proud Cox said receiving the awards felt great.
“I’m just glad I put in all my effort for the team and helped them improve for next year,” he said. “It seems like we made a lot of improvement last year to this year.”
Cox said his responsibility was to keep the pressure on the defense when the opposing team had the ball, and then transition into attack.
Cox began his soccer career in the Seymour park and rec leagues at Freeman Field when he was 4.
“I’ve enjoyed all the friendships with coaches and teammates, even some of the parents and everyone involved,” he said. “I’ve enjoyed my experience with Seymour soccer. I’ll miss it.”
The Owls were 5-9-1 overall and 2-4-1 in the HHC. Dennis said the win total was an improvement over 2019.
“It’s a step forward. I think what we did this year was good. I think the team is taking steps in the right direction,” he said.
“We played one of the toughest schedules in southern Indiana. A couple years ago, we were winning 14 games, but we were beating nobody. This year, we were battle tested to the point nobody wanted to draw us in the sectional. You could see what we put on the field against Floyd Central was way better than what we put on the field against East Central (at the beginning of season). As long as we improve, I think our tough schedule is going to do wonders for us.”
Dennis said it was great to get the season in through the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It’s a team effort, and it takes a lot of people to do what we do,” Dennis said. “It’s a lot of time from guys that are putting a lot of time into kids that are on their own. We do it because we really feel like they are our own kids.”
The COVID-19 pandemic hovered all season.
“I ask a lot out of the players,” Dennis said. “We had to truncate the season. We didn’t have the preseason that we’re used to. We didn’t have the summer workouts. I pushed you guys, and you guys responded.”
Tsubasa Kato also was named all-HHC, and Luke Reasoner and Isaac Shafer received HHC honorable mention.
Brody Unterseher was named most improved, Casey Regruth was named defender of the year, Shafer was named attacker of the year and Kevin Cervantes received the coach’s award.
Cox, Roman Ramirez, Rosa, Schafer, Gabe Baker, Will Cottrill, Kato, Avery Penegar, Reasoner, Regruth and Donovyn Thomas were named academic all-state. Dennis said players had to have an accumulated grade-point average of 3.7 or higher.
Talmadge Reasoner coached the junior varsity to a record of 9-3-2. Alfredo Gasper was named the most improved player, and Mauricio Aragon was named the most valuable JV player.
The JV was undefeated against HHC teams, scored 31 goals to 16 for opponents and had six shutouts.
Dennis encouraged the players coming back to work hard in the offseason, and he encouraged the seniors to “give back to the game.”
He also said the Seymour youth soccer leagues need people to help coach, officiate and in other areas, and anyone interested in helping can contact him. Those players could grow up to be future Owls.