Soccer
Favorite athlete: Julie Ertz
Favorite team: USWNT
Favorite memory competing in sports: Celebrating with my team after scoring the game-winning goal against South this season
Funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: Falling in a club game when there was absolutely no one around me
Music on playlist: Harry Styles
Future plans: Attend college and major in mathematics or engineering
Favorite motto: "You don't realize the true value of a moment until it becomes a memory."
One goal before turning 30: Go skydiving
One thing people don't know about me: I was a performance jump roper in elementary school. Sometimes I pull out a trick during fitness!
By Mary Jane Souder
Mike Moyer vividly remembers the first time Keely McGlone caught his eye on the soccer pitch. The then slight-of-build rising Central Bucks West sophomore was playing in a summer league game at Quakertown.
“I just remember there was a corner kick, she was on the back post and the ball came across, and she blocked it from going in by jumping up and having it hit her on the side of the face – this was in a summer league games that means nothing,” Moyer said. “I remember turning to my assistant and saying, ‘Who was that?’”
Looking for a player to fill the sizable shoes of Allie Walsh, who graduated that spring, the West coach made McGlone the immediate frontrunner for the job.
“I knew Megan Gallagher was going to be a center back, but I needed another center back to replace Allie,” Moyer said. “So the next couple practices and summer league games I kept my eye on Keely. She was a really, really smart player.
“She didn’t have all the tools, but she could play, and she would run through a wall for anyone on her team. By the time the season started, she was the starting center back, and she hasn’t missed a game back there since.”
These days McGlone is the captain of West squad that is off to an impressive start. A respected leader and standout player, McGlone endured some growing pains her rookie season. One game, in particular, was a defining moment in the career of the now CB West senior.
It’s been two years since that game at Souderton that changed everything, but McGlone remembers it like it was yesterday. So does her coach.
“The game was away, it was a 3:30 afternoon game,” said McGlone. “I remember every detail. This was the year Souderton won the state championship and they were a very talented team.
“It was a goalie punt, and I totally misjudged the ball. I thought it was not going to bounce when it did, I thought it was going to be in the air a little bit longer, so I didn’t go to it really. It bounced, and I wasn’t expecting it, and I was just sort of standing there flatfooted like a deer in the headlights, and it went straight over my head.
“Nobody on the defensive line thought I was going to miss that, so they weren’t really dropped behind me. Souderton had a really fast forward who just came in, took it and scored. Before the ball even hit the back of the net, Mike had a girl at the 50 ready to sub me out. I got off the field, and I’ve never heard someone scream so much. He said, ‘Every game you let balls go over your head.’ He was so annoyed with me. I didn’t say anything. There was nothing to say. He was completely right – it was a terrible play.”
McGlone took a seat on the bench. A teammate offered to bring her water bottle.
“I just shook my head, I did not want to be talked to,” she said. “I was so upset. He ended up putting me back in the second half to play the rest of the game. We ended up losing.
“I felt so guilty because it was such a simple play, and I was just being sort of careless. If I had tried my hardest on that one play, the game could have turned out differently.”
It’s a story that could have gone in many directions. McGlone could have directed her frustration at her coach, and it could have negatively affected her play. That didn’t happen. As a matter of fact, the exact opposite did.
“Mike was very mad at me, and he did not let me forget it,” she said. “I’m a person who channels – I wouldn’t say negative energy because it’s not negative energy, but when people are hard on me, that makes me want to try harder because I know I’m not performing to my full potential.
“The way I see it – people are hard on you because they know you can do better, and you have so much more to offer.”
That response tells you all anyone ever has to know about Keely McGlone. It certainly told her coach everything he needed to know about his sophomore center back.
“I tattooed Kelly,” Moyer said. “I completely killed her in front of the team, and the next game she comes back and plays lights out and was one of the reasons we beat Pennridge that year.
“That’s when I knew I had a special player. It shows the kind of character she has. I converse with her before every single game about the starting lineup, about what she likes and what she thinks. I always tell her this isn’t my team – it’s our team. She is like having a coach on the field – that’s how much I trust her.”
The mutual respect between McGlone and Moyer is apparent.
“We all laugh about it now, we talk about it all the time because it was very bad – how mad he was at me,” she said. “It was not a good experience, but it’s funny now. We can laugh about it because I came back from it.”
McGlone attributes her ability to take that experience for exactly what it was and nothing more to her parents.
“There were times I would come home and I would be so frustrated,” she said. “My parents were both college athletes, so they know what it’s like to have someone ride you like that.
“When I would come home upset, I would tell them, and they’d be like, ‘Listen, you have to do better next time. He’s right, you know he’s right, and he’s trying to get you to perform better.’ I think my parents are a big part of that too because even in regular life they’re like that. They’re always emphasizing – ‘You give 100 percent effort in all you do, and I’ll be happy.’ They don’t really settle for excuses being made, and I think that’s where I get it from.”
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When it came to sports, it’s always been soccer for McGlone. She took to it immediately and was not one of those youngsters picking flowers instead of pursuing the ball.
“That was not me, which is weird because that’s exactly what my parents thought would be me,” McGlone said. “I wasn’t a very athletic little kid really, so it was surprising.
“There’s this video my dad actually posted on YouTube of me playing soccer. As soon as I got on the field, I was just like destroying all these little kids.
“In elementary school and later middle school, I tried basketball. I did field hockey, which I really liked, but none of them stuck the way soccer did.”
In the early years, McGlone saw action at goalie and also defense.
“For a while, goalie was my main position – I liked it,” she said. “I liked the aspect where you could come off your line and challenge forwards. I liked taking the ball from them and beating them to balls in the box. It’s always been more of that aspect for me. I’m just very competitive and I like beating people to the 50/50 balls.
“Defense is so much tenacity, and it’s so much hard work. I think what I liked about it – you get to be a little fearless, I guess. You get to go in for hard tackles, you get to save the game sort of. I never was a person who cared about scoring, that was never my thing. I just liked being able to work really hard and working for my team, that aspect of it.”
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McGlone got her soccer start in Central Bucks Athletic Association (CBAA) and went the usual route, initially playing for PA Rush on the club circuit and moving from there to the Ukrainian Nationals, but it was when she moved to FC Bucks the summer before eighth grade that she found a home.
Thanks at least in part to her take-one-in-the-face play in summer league, McGlone found herself in the starting lineup as a sophomore.
“Mike talks about that all the time,” she said. “Before that summer going into 10th grade, Mike never really was impressed by me.
“The thing with Mike is he loves people who work their hardest and give 110 percent for their team, they don’t duck out of headballs. You don’t have to be a superstar dribbler. He just wants people that work hard. I was honestly never like that until I switched to my FC Bucks team and got this other coach.”
‘This other coach’ is Pennridge head coach Audrey Anderson.
“Honestly, I credit that to her,” McGlone said of taking the shot in the face. “I didn’t care as much if I would duck out of something like that, but I realized if you’re going to be on the field, why not try your hardest? I don’t care about that stuff – it hurts for a couple of seconds, but honestly, it’s more worth it to me to stop something like that than to duck out of it and let something detrimental happen to the team.”
McGlone impressed Anderson from day one.
“When I met her, I was like, ‘This kid has so much potential,’” the Rams’ coach said. “She’s so easy to coach, like a sponge. She just wanted to hear what she could do next. I’m a tough coach. Woman or not a woman, there are expectations and standards, and she just never failed to reach or surpass those expectations. She has grown so much since I’ve met her.
“I just love her fight. The fight that she has in her – it’s almost like she’s not satisfied with really anything. She always wants to go a little bit farther and a little bit harder. I watch a lot of game film. I know Keely really well. I will always look at players that I’ve coached and see how they react. Just her expressions on the field and her drive on the field say so much about her. When you talk about character, her character is amazing. When you watch her play, even if you don’t know her, I think you know who she is as a person. She’s never going to be satisfied with the easy road. She’s going to keep pushing and pushing and pushing and make things happen. She’s a great kid.”
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McGlone, a three-year starter at center back, was MVP of her West squad as a junior and has been a key to the Bucks’ strong showing so far this season.
“She’s a great kid on and off the field, her parents are awesome,” Moyer said. “I have the type of relationship with Keely where I can be completely honest with her and she respects that.”
Personal accolades are secondary to McGlone, who has taken so much from her years on the soccer field.
“One of the best parts of it has obviously been all the teammates I’ve met throughout the process,” she said. “My high school teammates – I love them so much. They are my best friends. I tell them that all the time, and it’s so great to play a sport that you love with people who are also passionate about it and are there for you as a friend and as a teammate. It’s not just my high school team, it’s every team I’ve played for.
“Also, just the mental toughness. Before I started playing high school and before I played for FC Bucks, I let things get to me. I was pretty sensitive, and it’s normal to be sensitive, but it’s given me a lot of mental toughness. It’s not easy to get yelled at, but I’ve learned the value of that and how that’s trying to make you better, and you have to channel that in the right way and make it a positive thing to try and make yourself better. I think that applies everywhere in life, not only on the soccer field because things are tough in the classroom and in social life. It’s beneficial to be mentally tough, and I think that’s one of the huge things soccer has given me.”
With the COVID 19 pandemic threatening to steal her final season, McGlone is grateful for every minute spent with her team.
“I love high school soccer so much,” she said. “It’s been one of the best experiences I’ve had in high school. When PIAA finally released that we were having a season, I was just so happy. I don’t even have another emotion.
“You know you have four years, and that’s all you have, and you want to play those four years. I’m so thankful they gave us a chance to play. The season has been amazing so far. If I wouldn’t be able to play it, I’d probably be a mess right now.”
Collegiate soccer – whether varsity or club – will be part of McGlone’s future. She is considering Notre Dame, Michigan, Boston University, Northeastern and Pitt and will major in either math or engineering. She has not ruled out the possibility of attending a smaller school if it would be the right fit.
“It’s tough because I’m thinking of a lot of bigger schools, and I definitely will play club soccer if I do attend one of those because I can’t give soccer up,” she said. “It means too much to me. I’ve looked at a couple smaller schools for soccer, but nothing has really been the right fit for me in the classroom, and that’s what I’m trying to prioritize.
“If something comes up that’s the right opportunity, I would, of course, play in college, but I don’t want to give of the academic side because that ultimately determines the rest of your life.”
McGlone is a high achiever off the soccer field as well. With a course load that included four AP classes last year and four more this year, the West senior boasts an impressive 4.3 GPA. Even more impressive is her 1520 score on the SATs. She is a member of the National Honor Society and has volunteered in the community with NHS.
“She’s a priceless kid,” Moyer said. “The worst part of being a high school coach – you only get to spend four years with these kids. After this year, I’m never going to coach Keely again, and it breaks my heart because I wish I had 11 Keelys on my team all the time.”
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