First things first — that’s Kasey Keller’s game.
The current Seattle Sounders FC goalkeeper enjoyed his stay at Cliff McCrath’s Northwest Soccer Camp so much that one summer he put the U.S. National Team on hold for a bit.
“We went up to him and said, ‘Hey Kasey, the national team is on the phone and they want you to attend their camp,’” remembers McCrath of the 18-year-old keeper. “And he said, ‘No, I’ve still got two days left here. I’ll talk to them later.’”
On a similar note, 1999 U.S. women’s team World Cup champion Michelle Akers passed on attending a White House ceremony in order to fulfill her coaching duties at McCrath’s camp.
After 38 years teaching the beautiful game at Camp Casey in Coupeville, McCrath and company will be setting up their nets at Bastyr University in Kenmore this summer.
“Seattle Pacific University would not renew our contract because they wanted to run their own camps,” said camp founder and director McCrath, 74, who coached the SPU men’s team to 37 consecutive winning seasons (a college men’s national record). “Because the program itself will not change — great staff, great soccer, great things happen — it was almost a miracle that through the contact of a former faculty member (SPU colleague and Bastyr President Daniel Church), we were introduced to Bastyr, and Bastyr opened the doors.”
SPU owns the Camp Casey property and Associate Vice President of Business and Finance Craig Kispert agreed with McCrath’s comment on the move, adding that Northwest Soccer Camp was a great tenant for nearly four decades.
U.S. Hall of Famer McCrath is putting his best foot forward in moving his operations to Bastyr for seven weeks, June 27-Aug. 13, for both resident and day camps. He said his resident players will have access to the university’s new dorms, which will include spacious rooms, a large lobby with a flat-screen TV and more.
McCrath estimates that about 2,000 players — ages 5-18 — will participate in the camp this summer alongside about 50 staffers, including college and high-school coaches, trainers and other personnel. At press time, 100 kids have registered and will soon become part of an alumni list of 70,000 strong (locals, plus players from 39 states and 14 countries). As a bonus, Northwest Soccer Camp gives out $40,000 in scholarships each year.
“It’s a paradise of sorts,” McCrath said of Bastyr. “We’ve walked it and studied it.”
As of last week, McCrath and Bastyr officials were still piecing together a five-year contract, but he noted that essentially all systems are go. Come late June, they’ll be marking fields and setting up five sets of regulation-size goals and 12 sets of smaller goals.
McCrath, who is nicknamed “Uncle Nubber” because he lost the tops of three fingers on his left hand in an accident as a child living in Detroit, Mich., said the best part about his camp is, “Just to see a kid master something that’s giving him a problem.”
He again referenced Akers, noting that as an 8-year-old he noticed her great right foot, ability to “head a ball better than 18- to 20-year-old men” and said to “keep your eye on this one — she’s special.”
“I guess I never even consciously think I had anything to do with it,” he added. “I sit here very fortunate to just have been in the audience, just to be around the fringe.
“Maybe if there was a conscious effort, I tried to stay out of the way of the Michelle Akers’s and the Kasey Kellers and make sure they had enough space to do what their dream was asking them to do.”
As a testament to the camp’s staying power, McCrath said that last year executive director Denise Foreman kicked off a legacy program for alumni. Turns out a woman who attended the camp at age 18 took her granddaughter to the camp and had tears of joy running down her face.
“She said, ‘I just pray I live long enough to have a great-granddaughter come to camp and learn soccer and learn things about life that I did,’” McCrath proudly said.
For camp information, visit www.nwsoccer.org.
