Soccer
Favorite athlete: Manti Te’o
Favorite team: Notre Dame
Favorite memory competing in sports: My senior year in high school soccer.
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: When I was in middle school on my travel team, we had a game, and it was really muddy, so I went up to take the kick, and as I went to kick the ball, I landed straight on my back. I was covered in mud, and my whole family, grandparents and all, were at that game.
Music on iPod: Everything, but I like Wiz Khalifa
Future plans: Play soccer at the collegiate level and get a good education.
Words to live by: ‘The harder you work, the luckier you get.’
One goal before turning 30: To complete college, move out west so I can ski out there and then find a job in the medical field.
One thing people don’t know about me: A lot of people don’t know that I have a very one-of-a-kind sense of humor and that I am really corny.
By Mary Jane Souder
Rick Schmidt has a policy of naming only one captain each year, and the Upper Dublin coach’s criteria for choosing that one player is actually quite simple.
“I look for the captain to be a role model,” Schmidt said.
Schmidt didn’t have to look far to find the person he wanted to lead this year’s squad. He chose Tyler Whitehead.
“As the lone captain, Tyler is the right arm of the coaching staff,” Schmidt said. “He demonstrated not only outstanding skills as a player but also the qualities that make him an outstanding leader among his peers.
“He can be trusted to perform calmly and professionally in a manner that befits his position as captain in the most stressful situations, and he demonstrated on many occasions the ability to galvanize other players around him to raise their own performance towards a common team goal. His enthusiasm and commitment to the sport of soccer and his fellow players is unwavering, and he has served as an outstanding role model for other players.”
Whitehead’s composure served him well as the anchor of the Flying Cardinals’ defense.
“If there’s one position on the field that has to play with composure, it’s defense – between that and the keeper, and he just had that,” Schmidt said. “Tyler has great size and combined that with a level of composure you have to have as a defender.”
A three-year starter for the Flying Cardinals, Whitehead was one of the league’s premiere defenders, earning first team honors in each of the last two years and earning his own team’s Excellence in Defense award. He has been playing defense since he was introduced to the sport as a youngster.
“On my travel team, I was the only kid that could kick the ball really hard,” he said. “My coach just stuck me back there and said, ‘Whenever the ball comes to you, just kick it out.
“I enjoyed it and stuck with it because I enjoy it.”
As for the not-so-little matter of composure, Whitehead acknowledges that staying calm is key.
“You can’t be going 110 percent all the time,” he said. “You have to see the whole field and be relaxed.”
Whitehead began competing in soccer the first year her was eligible to play. He also played baseball, but in fifth grade traded in baseball for lacrosse. He also added basketball to his resume. He continued to play three sports until his junior year when he opted to devote himself to soccer.
“My dad actually played soccer at Temple, so he was a big influence,” Whitehead said. “Every kid wants to grow up to be like their dad. He didn’t force me to play. I wanted to do it, and I was good at it. It kind of worked out.”
When he arrived on the scene at Upper Dublin, Schmidt was immediately impressed by – you guessed it – Whitehead’s composure.
“He always played with a certain amount of composure that was nice to see,” the Flying Cardinals’ coach said. “With sophomores, that’s a little unusual.”
Whitehead was part of a strong class that left its mark this season, finishing second only to Wissahickon in the SOL American Conference with an 11-1-2 league mark. The Flying Cardinals earned a berth in districts where they fell to Spring-Ford in the opening round.
“This definitely was our year to do everything,” Whitehead said. “All of us except one played on the same Upper Dublin travel team. From then on , we split into different teams and did our own thing, but we all joined up in high school which was really fun.
“From an Upper Dublin standpoint, we were the most successful team that has been through there in a while. We broke records for our team, and not every team can say they did that. It was good to walk away with that our senior year.”
Eight seniors were part of this year’s group, and according to Whitehead, this group had a special camaraderie.
“Nobody had problems with anybody,” he said. “When you’re on the field, you might yell at somebody, but once we’re off the field, everyone is friends again.
“It was a really good group this year. Our chemistry was great because everyone did everything together.”
Whitehead named teammate Jared D’Andrea his co-captain.
“He and I worked together really well being able to communicate – not necessarily yelling at kids but bringing them aside if they did something wrong and telling them what to do the next time and how to fix it,” Whitehead said. “Nobody really snipped at anybody or said, ‘Why did you do that?’
“Everybody was like, ‘All right, next time try and do that.’ It was more of a laidback team. Everything was positive, nothing was negative. That kept everybody up. Nobody was down. Everybody was really confident.”
Credit for some of that certainly has to go to Whitehead’s leadership.
“He’s dependable both on and off the field, which is why we made him a captain,” Schmidt said.
Whitehead has made a verbal commitment to take his soccer talents to Shippensburg. In the end, it came down to Shippensburg and Slippery Rock.
“They’re actually losing a lot of their defenders, so I’ll have a good chance of playing a little bit next year and might have a chance to start three years, which would be really great,” Whitehead said. “I could have gone to a D-1 school where I wouldn’t play. I could say I was on the team, but I wouldn’t play, and that’s not fun. Having the opportunity to play is so important.”
Whitehead plans to pursue a career in athletic training or sports medicine.
“My dad is in the medical field,” he said. “I took sports medicine classes in high school, and I’m taking anatomy now. It’s just what I’m really interested in.”
Ask Whitehead what he will remember most about his high school soccer career, and he doesn’t point to the games or even his teammates. Instead, he acknowledges the influence of his coach.
“I remember coming up my freshman year I was kind of scared of him,” Whitehead said. “Every year you get closer to him.
“This year, you could share anything with him. You didn’t have to hold anything back. He was the nicest guy. He was almost like a dad, and I felt so close to him.”
Schmidt has a mutual respect for his senior captain.
“He offers the ‘total package’ coaches always wish for in their student-athletes,” the Flying Cardinals’ coach said. “He’s a great kid.”
