Decorah becoming a soccer town, too

DECORAH - It's still about football at Decorah High School. In the summer, it's about Coach O - Dennis Olejniczak and the baseball team.

You're talking 28 state playoff/tournament appearances and seven championships in those two sports. There's quite a tradition in this Northeast Iowa college town.

But maybe, just maybe, the good folks here are turning into soccer heads. At least a little bit.

“People in the community are buying in,” said senior striker Mitchell White.

“Like you said, in Decorah, it's always football and baseball,” said senior midfielder Martin Stalberger. “But now you're seeing tons of people at our games that you'd never see three or four years ago.”

Hey, everyone loves a winner, and Decorah's got one in that “other sport.” The Vikings went into their game Monday against Waverly-Shell Rock with a 13-0 record and No. 2 ranking in Class 2A.

They are the only undefeated boys' soccer team in the state.

“I expected them to do well this season,” said Coach Dave Keller. “But I wouldn't say I thought we'd be undefeated. It's their resiliency. They've shown when it comes down to it, they are able to simply outwork their opponents. They have that desire.”

Which is an amazing trait considering their youth. A Luther College graduate and two-year assistant before taking over as head coach this season, Keller starts six sophomores.

Decorah finished third at the 2A state tournament last season, losing only to Dubuque Wahlert (once in the regular season, once in the state semifinals). So many guys graduated from that record-breaking team, making this season sort of hard to figure.

“Coming in, there were a lot of question marks, in terms of expectations,” said White. “But a lot of guys have stepped up.”

They even beat nemesis Wahlert earlier this month, 2-1.

“That win was big for the guys who were around last year,” said Stalberger, a tri-captain with White and Paul Vanney.

The schools are in the same postseason regional, so a return match is distinctly possible. But you get the feeling these Vikings aren't afraid of that.

They're on a roll, and they expect to keep it going.“Now that the season has played out as it has, it'd be a disappointment not to make it back to state,” White admitted.

“I knew we were going to be really young this year,” Stalberger said. “But the young guys have played their butts off. It took a couple of games to find the right places for everyone, the right spots. The younger kids, you could tell they were a little shellshocked at first. They'd never seen the field at the varsity level before. But they've grown into it.”

Kind of like Decorah has grown into soccer.

“At Luther especially, we've started to really involve the youth development program here in town,” said Keller, also an assistant coach at Luther. “Now you're getting kids to show up for high school and college games. That's pretty cool.”