When Edmeston’s Dan Cheatham showed up at the school five years ago, talking about state titles in boys soccer, his young players didn’t know what to think.
“Cheatham always talked about going to states and he got clowned, like straight up clowned,” senior defender Landon Wust said. “I thought he was a fool until last year, and then I realized, we did have that opportunity this year.”
“To be fully honest, right at the start, I didn’t like him,” said junior midfielder Braymon Clark, who like most of the Panther players, started with Cheatham when he was the modified coach, “but over that year as it progressed, I learned he was really a great coach.”
The Panthers are believers now. Edmeston (14-2-3) the Tri-Valley League, Class D Section IV and Regional champions, will play in the boys soccer Class D Final Four at 8:30 a.m., Saturday, Nov. 15, in Middletown, against Section V champion Fillmore. The winner will return to Middletown the next day to play for a state title against either Section VII champion Chazy or Section III winner Hamilton.
The chance for a state title didn’t just seem unlikely when Cheatham, a guidance counselor, arrived at the school. Two weeks into this season, the Panthers were 1-2-1, with losses to Marathon and Clinton and a tie with Gilboa-Conesville/Roxbury in the Stamford Mayor’s Cup. However, Edmeston advanced in the tournament on penalty kicks, and a week later, beat South Kortright/Andes for the tournament title.
“We played a really hard beginning to our season,” Cheatham said. “When I talked to (athletic director) Jen (Bolton) last year about scheduling this year, this is what I asked for, I wanted it tough. I think in the beginning they were like, ‘oh, we’re doing this?’ But now they can see it.”
“Clinton was very good,” Wust said. “We were able to hold them. It was a rainy day, and they got a couple through late, but I think that was when our defense started to play well together.”
Edmeston hasn’t lost since Sept. 10. A No. 3 seed in the Section IV Class D tournament, the Panthers shut out No. 2 Notre Dame, 4-0, before tying top seed G-C/R, again, but this time in the section championship game. The two teams shared the section title, but Edmeston again advanced on penalty kicks.
“(Goalie) Sire (Champen) really stepped it up in PKs,” Wust said.
“To me, defense wins championships,” Clark said. “They really came through this year for us.”
Cheatham praises his defenders, too, but said the strength of his team is in the middle and up the sidelines.
“We’ll win the game in our strikers and outside midfielders,” he said. “Our middle, they’re tough. In our back line, we had a rough three or four games, where we were giving up a lot of goals, but since then, I think we have only given up five or six.”
“I think the whole time, we have had these skills,” junior forward Brock Redner said. “We just hadn’t been able to gel together. I think halfway through the season, we really started to come together.”
Cheatham played in a Class C state championship game while a student at Lansing in 2004. The year before, Edmeston won a Class D title, the last time the Panther boys have been in the state title game.
Now, one game away from a chance for another state title, no one is clowning on Cheatham.
“I think he has definitely improved us,” Redner said. “We were mainly a kick it over the top and run team, tire them out, before we got tired out. He has taught us a lot. It slowed us down and made us think a little bit. I think he is a great coach. He has done nothing but great things for us, in my opinion.”
Nov. 14, the team will practice for the last time. It is a milestone Cheatham said he enjoys.
“The best part of this experience is, I am with these guys (until the end),” he said. “It has always been a unique feeling to know when the finality is. If you are talking about the section championship game, you don’t know. Now, we know when the last game is. My last practice with these guys is Friday. There’s something nostalgic about that.”
For Wust and the seniors, after five years of school athletics and almost 10 more years of summer camps and soccer leagues, the final goal is in sight.
“I have been playing soccer since I was four,” Wust said. “It has always been with this same group. For us, as a senior, this is our last shot. It is great to have this as my final year of soccer.”