Podcast: Maine women’s head coach Scott Atherley on following up historic success

Maine women's head coach Scott Atherley joined 'The Goal.' (Maine Athletics)

The latest guest on New England Soccer Journal’s “The Goal” podcast is Maine women’s soccer head coach Scott Atherley.

In 2024, Atherley is entering his 26th season leading the program. In 2023, he guided the Black Bears to the program’s first-ever America East title and NCAA Tournament berth, as he and his staff earned America East Coaching Staff of the Year honors. The Black Bears got off to an 8-0-4 start for the longest undefeated start to begin a season in program history. Striker Abby Kraemer became the first-ever All-American in program history, while also being one of seven Black Bears to be named to an All-America East team.

A native of Andover, Conn., Atherley was a standout player for the Black Bears during his career. He was a four-year letterwinner at UMaine, serving as team captain in his final season, where he was selected as a New England Intercollegiate Soccer League (NEISL) All-Star and Maine Collegiate All-State.

Athlerley joined host Matt Langone to discuss last season’s historic success and the outlook for the upcoming campaign.

The full podcast can be accessed below and is available on all major platforms. If you enjoy it, please leave a rating and a review.

Here are some highlights from our discussion with Atherley:

On the 2023 season:

Atherley: “We had a lot of momentum coming out of the 2022 season. I think there was the sense that we had come close in ‘22 and we just felt like we fell short. But, really, we saw 2023 as a real opportunity for us to just build off of the momentum that we had in ‘22.”

On competing in the America East Conference:

Atherley: “I think it’s great. Really the mark of our conference is parity — even the teams that don’t qualify for postseason play are good enough on any day to beat anybody. That just makes it really exciting, it makes it competitive.”

On his recruiting pitch:

Atherley: “I think, first of all, there’s a lot of attractive components to our school and our university. I tell everybody it’s a world class institution, in terms of getting an education. For me, the value of the education here is second to none. So for me, that’s an easy sell. And if you look at the complexion of the players that we have, our collective grade point average of our team is a 3.85. So, these kids want to come, they want to be serious about school, they want to focus academically, they don’t want distractions, they want to be on a winning team.”

On the players’ mind sets entering this season:

Atherley: “They’re hungry. The first thing is we’re not defending anything. It’s a different story, it’s a different team, it’s a different set of circumstances. So, our theme is that we’re chasing a new title.”