Don’t look now, but Kansas soccer coach Nate Lie is entering the stage of his career where he’s actually OK with celebrating things as they happen.
Even the idea of that makes Lie chuckle.
But this is not a knock. Lie did not get where he is today, nor did this KU program grow so immensely under him during his first season in Lawrence, by leaning on complacency and operating a we’ve-arrived mentality.
In fact, one of the main tenets of the Kansas soccer program run by Lie is that there’s always room to improve and more work to be done.
So, as the Jayhawks move into a big weekend at home, with Baylor and No. 8 TCU coming to town, give Lie credit for adapting just enough to be able to celebrate the good things as they happen.
One such good thing is the Jayhawks’ 7-0-2 start, which includes a win in last week’s Big 12 opener at Oklahoma State. It’s the best starting streak in program history, and it still has the Jayhawks undefeated nearly halfway through the season.
Lie loves that. He appreciates it. And he believes it’s worth acknowledging. At least for a little while.
“I don’t want to be afraid to talk about things (like that) around the team,” he said Tuesday. “I don’t want to purposefully avoid them.”
So, they don’t.
“These players deserve it. But we haven’t really done anything yet. All the big stuff’s still ahead. We’ve just set the table to allow ourselves to hopefully see this through.”
— KU coach Nate Lie on the team's success thus far
In fact, he said the Jayhawks have developed a bit of a “weekly cadence,” where they routinely and dutifully talk about the new national polls, KU’s RPI ranking and where they sit in each of them.
And then they get back to work.
This week, at least according to Top Drawer Soccer, the Jayhawks were dubbed a Top-10 team, ranked No. 9 in the latest poll. The United Soccer Coaches Poll has the Jayhawks 14th. And unbeaten KU sits 11th in the latest RPI rankings, five spots ahead of TCU and two in front of Baylor, this week’s two opponents at Rock Chalk Park.
“The team knows,” Lie said. “It actually came up in the last meeting without me mentioning it. It’s exciting, and these players work really, really hard. And I think it’s nice to celebrate that. But, for me, a season’s judged at the end. We’re gonna play 19 regular season matches, and we’re 9 in. So, we’re not even halfway in.”
As much as they enjoy seeing their hard work pay off in real time, the players themselves appear to have fully embraced the same approach as their head coach, smiling when they see the rankings or hear praise and then slapping that scowl of intensity right back on their faces for training.
“It’s great to be able to go undefeated,” sophomore defender Jordan Fjelstad said Tuesday. “But each day it’s a new goal. It’s like, ‘Hey, what are we gonna do to win this game,’ and, ‘OK, we won that game, now we move on.’ We don’t stay in the past. How are we gonna achieve in this game? Hopefully by the end of our season, we’ll be in a good spot.”
So far, at least, that approach has worked very well. And it has the Jayhawks feeling good and in position to be serious when they talk about challenging for Big 12 titles and postseason berths.
A couple of those already came, of course. Last season, KU won the Big 12 tourney title and advance to the NCAA Tournament as a No. 9 seed.
But that was last year. Things are different this year. New roster, new faces, new goals.
Same mindset, though. In large part because the returning players on this team have a greater understanding of what KU soccer is under Nate Lie and that has allowed them to start further along and also help the newcomers get up to speed quicker.
“I feel like we’ve grown a lot since last year, even (from) the end of the season last year,” sophomore Kate Langfelder said on Tuesday. “I feel like we’ve just grown our identity and as a team and in our culture.”
At the heart of that culture is hard work and the idea that striving for better remains constant.
Even after a strong effort on a Thursday, Lie said, “the first thing they’re probably gonna hear from me, after great job, is, ‘Let’s back this up on Sunday.’”
“To survive a season of 19-20 matches, and playing most of those twice a week, I think you have to kind of just stay in the moment and approach each game separately,” he added. “And then there’s plenty of time to reflect on anything we did or didn’t accomplish afterwards.”
“These players deserve it,” he added. “But we haven’t really done anything yet. All the big stuff’s still ahead. We’ve just set the table to allow ourselves to hopefully see this through.”
He then continued, talking through the lens of what an opportunity like facing TCU at home — noon Sunday at Rock Chalk Park — can do for any program.
“If you're going to talk about RPI, you're going to talk about how those games can help you, and how a Top-25 win can catapult you in a lot of different ways, I don't want our team to dismiss the possibility for a conference championship. I don't think that is off the table,” he said. “So, if you're gonna even think about those things, you probably gotta go through a program like that. I think TCU is a measuring stick, and probably the measuring stick within our conference.”
But first, it’s Baylor at 7 p.m. Thursday at Rock Chalk Park. And Lie is not in any way worried about his team forgetting to focus on the Bears.
“Baylor's Top-20 RPI in the country right now,” Lie said. “We are not in a position to overlook a Top-20 team. Period. End of sentence. And I don't think we'll have to worry about that. I can't say that we're gonna play great on Thursday, but if we don't, I don't think it's because we're overlooking them.”
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