On Monday, December 8th, Mr. Craig Schneider was announced as the new Head Coach of the Belmont Hill Varsity Soccer Team. Coach Schneider takes over with an outstanding resume. As a player, he was an All-State honoree at Manchester High School in Connecticut before taking his talents to Trinity College, where he was a four-year starter, captained the team in his senior year, and was named All-NESCAC. After college, he continued his playing career, joining semi-pro side Glastonbury Celtic FC. Since then, he has played with a few other clubs before joining Charlestown FC, where he still plays today.
Additionally, Coach Schneider has an equally impressive coaching resume to date. He began his managerial career as the head coach at St. Clements High School, where he coached for two years before joining the staff at Malden Catholic, where he served as an assistant coach for five years, in addition to teaching there. After the 2014 season, Coach Schneider was offered the head coaching position at Malden Catholic; however, he declined the job to become a physics teacher at Belmont Hill, where he has coached the JVA soccer team. During his tenure as the head coach of JVA, his teams have achieved immense success, boasting multiple undefeated seasons and an impressive 51-7-7 record over the past four years.
In addition to his outstanding resume of results, a conversation with any past JVA player will tell you all you need to know about Coach Schneider. Imran Yonis ’27, a two-year veteran of the JVA team, said, “He has been my favorite coach at Belmont Hill because he makes it fun while also helping us get better and playing to win.” Leo Nurernberg ’27 felt a similar way, describing the coach as “someone who holds us to high standards while also making it enjoyable.” Both also touched on Coach Schneider’s sense of humor, specifically mentioning his typical British sayings as well as “Put the round thing in the rectangle thing more times than them,” a saying he uses to describe what the team needs to do to win.
When asked about his goals for the soccer program, Coach Schneider said he “Wants to establish a unified culture throughout the ranks from the 7th grade to the varsity team.” This was something Coach Schneider continually returned to in our interview: cohesion throughout the ranks. Given his experience as JVA coach, he hopes to use that team as a platform for varsity and to have the 3A team play a similar style to varsity. His hope in all of this is to help develop the younger guys so that they are ready to play when they join the varsity team.
In terms of tactics, Coach Schneider hopes to instill a fast-paced, possession-based style of soccer, with an atmosphere where “People want to show up every day and work.”
For next season on the field, Coach Schneider recognized that, in addition to coaching, the team would undergo significant roster changes, having graduated over half of the previous season’s roster. Therefore, Coach Schneider is entering the season with the mindset of not measuring success in terms of wins and losses, but instead of establishing the team’s culture for years to come. This culture will revolve around the mentality of “working harder than your opponents, controlling what you can control, and a constant commitment to improving.” With that, Coach Schneider believes “everything else will fall into line.” He added, “We can always work on fitness and tactics, but we want players to have desires to get better every day.”
One issue Coach Schneider will have to deal with under the new club soccer format is MLS Next players. Under current rules, MLS NEXT Homegrown players are not allowed to play high school soccer unless they receive a waiver from their clubs. At the moment, many of these players who attend Belmont Hill do not play for the school. Coach Schneider believes that many players are told by their club teams that MLS Next Homegrown is the best way to get to play at the next level. Coach Schneider hopes to create a program that these players want to be part of that offers them the full Belmont Hill experience.
In the future, Coach Schneider hopes to create a preseason trip to Europe similar to the one the team used to take to Costa Rica, to help build chemistry and camaraderie. He also hopes to build on the team’s success over the past few seasons by creating a program that can compete with any team in the ISL and New England. The Panel would like to congratulate Coach Schneider on his new role and wish him the best of luck!
