Christiansons enjoying foray into prep soccer

CEDAR RAPIDS - It was perhaps the biggest practice they've ever conducted.

Steve and Mike Robertson have coached soccer together for a while but this was different. The Cedar Rapids Kennedy co-coaches heard rumors all winter about Garret and Gabe Christianson joining their ranks but didn't know if they would turn out true.

The Christiansons were prominent players at the club level and for the U.S. Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program but had never played scholastically. Neither did their older brother, Ian, now at Georgetown University.

The boys indeed showed up at Harding Middle School for that first Kennedy practice last month. The Robertsons smiled.

“We hadn't talked to them explicitly about it,” said Mike Robertson. “Our philosophy is we want you 100-percent committed to our team during the season ... This just sort of worked out.”

Very well, so far.

Garret Christianson, a senior forward, leads Class 3A with 14 goals in seven games. Gabe, a junior midfielder, has set him up for a lot of those, evidenced by his 3A-leading 13 assists.

Kennedy is 6-1 and ranked fourth in 3A, despite losing a ton of starters to graduation off last season's third-place state tournament team. The Christiansons are a big reason for the reload and not the rebuild.

“We knew we'd have a good team this year because we've got a lot of depth in our program,” Steve Robertson said. “But those two guys just kind of filled in the cracks.”

“I'm having a lot of fun,” Gabe Christianson said. “I'm glad I came out.”

Gabe is widely considered one of the top 50 players nationally for his class and is being heavily recruited by several colleges. He is a finalist for the Gatorade state player of the year, unusual for a junior.

That shows his talent.

“I think it can be agreed that he might be the best player we've ever had,” Steve Robertson said.

“I'd thought about coming out in past years,” Gabe said. “But the Olympic Development Program and club has always had great (schedule) conflicts with high school soccer. So I basically chose ODP and my club soccer. But it slowed down this year. As we've gotten older, there have been less and less events for ODP, enough to make this work.”

Garret agreed with his brother. He just signed a letter of intent to play college soccer at Eastern Illinois.

“To be perfectly honest, my club soccer ... when it gets to this time of the year, most player play high school,” Garret said. “Club basically doesn't exist at this time. Kennedy's really the only place where I can come play soccer. People from school were telling me to go out, and it sounded like a good idea. So here we are.”

“The nice thing about these guys is they are really good guys,” Mike Robertson said. “We didn't really know what to expect. But they haven't come with any arrogance or sense of entitlement. There is no slacking at practice or anything like that. They work hard.”