Cashe Money: An Interview with Houston’s Corey Ashe

If Major League Soccer ever got around to creating an annual all-rookie team, then Corey Ashe would have been the undisputed starter on the left wing on this season’s freshman roster. His six assists during his rookie campaign with the Houston Dynamo is only the tip of the iceberg – his quickness, creativity, and symbiotic relationship with the ball in the middle was a key reason why his club was able to punch its ticket to another MLS Cup Final.

Needless to say, 2007 was quite a year for the diminutive (5-6), yet dizzying Dynamo rookie. The beginning of his veritable movie-script season began with the MLS defending champion selecting him in the second round (26th overall) from the University of North Carolina in the 2007 Super Draft. He starred on the reserve team during the early part of the season, before making his impact on the first team, where he appeared in 20 matches (six starts) for the Dynamo. Just as the summer began to wane, the speedy midfielder caught fire against Real Salt Lake on September 8th, when he sparked the Dynamo attack by recording assists on all but one of the four goals poured in by his club in their high-octane 4-3 victory.

Then, as if things couldn’t possibly become even more unreal for the former Tar Heel, he and his teammates capped off the 2007 campaign in grand fashion, by hoisting the MLS Cup trophy with their 2-1 victory over the New England Revolution.

With an opportunity to finally catch his breath after such a whirlwind season, the 21-year-old speedster graciously took the time to check in with Revsnet’s Brian O’Connell on his remarkable year.

Brian: I’ve talked to a few rookies this season about the comparison between college soccer and MLS, and they all remark how vastly different NCAA soccer is compared to MLS. Would you agree with that assessment? How much different is it, even for a player who comes from a traditional soccer college like UNC?

Corey: I would definitely agree with that assessment. With the MLS the ball moves faster, the technical ability the players posses is better than that of college, the players are smarter, and the level is higher.

Brian: Talking with ACC guys like Wells Thompson, Adam Cristman and Kyle Helton, it seems like the ACC is the premier college soccer conference in the nation. In your opinion, what is it about the ACC that makes it so competitive year in and year out?

Corey: The ACC is competitive year in and out because of the recruiting classes that each school receives. Most people are under the impression that this is the best conference so that attracts skillful players and players that want to make it to the professional ranks. Furthermore, I think the players that are recruited have either National team experience or have played on a regional team and if those players are in the conference it creates a more competitive atmosphere.

Brian: You were drafted earlier this year by a team that had just won the MLS Cup the year before. How much of an honor was it to be selected by a championship side?

Corey: It was a huge honor simply because they were the defending champs and because I heard a lot of good things about the coaching staff and the team. So it was an honor to know that Dominic and John thought I would fit well into their program.

Brian: What were your first impressions of Houston, with respect to the coaching staff, players, and management?

Corey: I thought that everything about the program was professional. The players and coaches were serious about winning and on the field they meant business. Off the field the players are your friends and if you need anything they have no problem with giving advice or assisting you.

Brian: Was there any player or coach you gravitated to that helped you along through your first season in the league?

Corey: Both coaches helped a lot but I gravitated towards John Spencer the assistant coach. He provided a lot of advice and worked with me one on one.

Brian: What was the most difficult aspect of your rookie season?

Corey: The most difficult aspect was adjusting to the speed of play. The ball moves so much faster so you usually have to have an idea of what you want to do with the ball before you get it.

Brian: What were your expectations for your first season in the League? Did you have any specific personal goals, whether it be getting a certain amount of first team games, or scoring a certain number of goals? Was there any additional pressure to achieve these goals because you were drafted by a team that had just won a championship?

Corey: Honestly I just wanted to play and develop as fast as I could. I obviously wanted to get some playing time with the first team but I knew it would be hard. So I didn’t really set any goals except to just develop as fast as I could.

Brian: Back on September 8th, you recorded three assists in the 4-3 victory over Real Salt Lake, which was unquestionably the best game of your rookie campaign. Tell me a little bit about how big of a game that was for you, and how you hope to build on a performance like that.

Corey: It was a huge game because my older brother came that weekend before he left for Iraq so I wanted to play hard for him and make him proud. So not only was it huge that I recorded three assists but I was happy to make him proud. It also did a lot for my confidence. It showed that I belong in this league.

Brian: Obviously, Houston did quite well this year, earning its second consecutive championship. What was it like to be able to celebrate a championship with your teammates in your very first pro season?

Corey: It was awesome to know that I contributed in my first season to a championship team. I helped get Houston to the finals and win. Also, I take away from this experience what it takes to be a champion. I understand the work that goes into making it to the finals and winning. So it was awesome celebrating.

Brian: Somewhat off-topic, but I looked at your MLSnet.com player profile, and it states that you enjoy rap and R & B music. As a fellow hip hop aficionado myself, who’s the better MC: 50 or Kanye?

Corey: They are both good but I would say Kanye simply because he is more creative with his lyrics unlike 50. He makes you think about what he is saying and his songs have a message that he is trying to get across to the listeners.

Brian: Is there a pre-match track that you like to listen to before kickoff? If so, which track?

Corey: Kanye West- “Champion.”

Brian: Lastly, with your first full pro season now under your belt, what can we expect from Corey Ashe next season?

Corey: More goals and assists and more of a complete and consistent player.

Rookies wave goodbye to Oka and Solle

Nobody said that a rookie’s life is ever easy.

Often times, a team’s incoming freshman are treated like bellhops and busboys, saddled with extra chores like lugging equipment around and carrying the goal to and fro during practice. In other words, they accept – involuntarily, of course -the work that no one else wants to do.

Yet, despite the tedious tasks, this year’s edition of Revolution rookies has formed a remarkably tight bond amongst themselves. In addition to collectively bearing the brunt of their added responsibilities, many of the rooks already shared a common thread before arriving in Foxboro, as many had played with or against each other since high school. Combine these factors and a wonderful sense of camaraderie becomes instilled, as full-fledged friendships become forged between the fresh faces.

So you can imagine that when the news of the club’s release of rookies Arsene Oka and Ryan Solle broke last Friday, there were more than a few raised eyebrows and shocked expressions.
“Ryan was kind of a prankster on the team, and at first you thought it might be a joke that he was playing on us. That’s what we were hoping: that it was just a joke,” said fellow rookie Chris Loftus.

Unfortunately, it was no playful ploy on the part of their fellow freshman, as the rookies had hoped, and soon Solle and Oka would be saying goodbye to their teammates and friends. As the news began sink in, the emotions then turned serious.

“Obviously everybody was shocked to hear (about them being released),” said Kyle Helton, a rookie right back, who’s known Solle since high school. “I wasn’t expecting that at all, and I don’t think any of the other guys were as well.”

Loftus agreed with his fellow rookie on his emotions when the news finally began to sink in.

“(It was) immediate shock, when I heard about it. Ryan is a very close friend of mine, and was close with all of the rookies, especially Wells (Thompson), because they went to school together.”

The Revolution rookies are indeed a close group, and regularly go out to dinner as like a family would, all knowing they can take solace in their common experiences as first year players.
So after the news finally began to set in on Friday night, the rookies did just that: they went out to dinner as a whole. There, they offered words of encouragement to their hard luck friends.

“I told (Solle) to keep his head up, and that opportunities will come his way, and that it’s not the end of the world,” said Loftus. “I feel terrible for Ryan because I know how hard he works and how much he loved being here with the guys on the team. He’s going find a team that can use him, and he’s going do well wherever he goes.”

Though the loss especially reverberated among the rookies on a personal level, Helton also acknowledged that the news served as a stark reminder of how unpredictable the life of a professional athlete can be.

“You have to play like every day’s your last. Obviously, you really don’t know what’s going to happen. You just have to come to practice and work hard everyday, and try and make an impact.”

Nevertheless, although the business of soccer can be painfully cruel to those who play it, sometimes all a player can do is simply accept the news when a teammate – often times, a friend – is cut by the team.

“It’s going be a tough loss for the team, especially within the rookies; we have a tight-knit group. We don’t want to lose anybody,” said a somber Helton. “They’re both going to be missed.”

Loftus explained that although his fellow rookie and friend Solle is no longer a member of the team, the bond would always remain.

“We’ll keep in touch for the rest of our lives. He’s a good friend of ours.”

The Rookie Perspective on ‘Beckhamania’

With a tsunami of media attention drawn toward David Beckham’s arrival in Foxboro this weekend, it’s certainly easy to get caught up in the whirlwind that accompanies the globe’s most popular soccer player. While the superstar’s grand entrance elicits various opinions and responses among the MLS’s senior statesmen and veterans, many of younger players’ views go unsolicited.

Well, Revsnet’s Brian O’Connell caught up with three of the Revolution rookies – Chris Loftus, Kyle Helton, and Ryan Solle- to get their take on “Beckhamania” and other topics.

Brian: When you guys first heard that he was coming here to MLS to play, what was your reaction?

Chris Loftus: I was kind of skeptical, at first. But once it kind of got finalized, I was excited. It’s good for the league. We’ll get a lot more people out to the games, and give soccer in the U.S. a little more exposure.

Kyle Helton: Yeah, I think it’s exciting, definitely, because there’ll be a lot more people obviously who want to come to the games. People who may not have even watched soccer before and now wanting to come and trying to get tickets and wanting to come to the game, and they find out that the game’s sold out and everything, and they’re really upset (at not being able to get tickets). I mean, I’m just excited to see people getting as excited as I am about the game.

Ryan Solle: Basically, they summed up everything. Maybe at first, I was a little skeptical, a little iffy about it, but at the same time he’s coming over now. And you start to see celebrities that want to hang out with him and start to come to soccer games in L.A. and I think (as a result) more and more people are starting to get into soccer and hopefully he can help the league out a lot.

Brian: Now with Beckham coming to New England – there has to be more ticket requests from friends and family, right?

Chris: Yeah, yeah definitely, especially for this game and I know a couple of guys on the team have had to get a lot of extra ticket for family and friends because a lot people want to come to the game. I guess we sold like 30,000 ticket for this game, so I think this game alone has helped us out a lot.

Brian: What kind of buzz has there been this week throughout the locker room with Beckham here this weekend?

Chris: We’re concerned about staying on top of the Eastern Conference right now. It’s not really about (Beckham coming here), we just worry about ourselves. I wouldn’t say it’s really changed at all, whatsoever in the locker room, to be honest with you. It’s just another game.
Brian: Have the coaches said anything to you guys about preparing for a game like this with all of the media attention focused on the game?

Kyle: No, I mean, I don’t think the coaches have said anything about Beckham in practice at all. It’s been pretty much get three points and play good football, and that’s about it.

Brian: As far as the camaraderie among the younger guys – you guys here are all first year players here, so what kind of things do you guys do just to encourage each other to get through the season to stay motivated?

Chris: Well I guess as a rookie class, we all live in pretty close range of each other. We do a lot of stuff off the field with each other. So anytime you have that kind of camaraderie off the field, it’s going to translate on the field as well. This week especially, all the starters only practiced a couple of times (due to the US Open Cup on Wednesday night). It’s good to play against other rookies and guy and compete against each other. The guys here are real good. We take criticism positively, and working to compete with one another on the field.

Brian: As rookies, I know you guys see a lot of your action in reserve league games. With a schedule of only 12 games, would it help if maybe there were more games to help get you more on-field playing time?

Kyle: Well I think it’s great that we have 12 reserve games, but it would be nice if we had a few more. But just with the guys that we have on our team I mean we have veterans and some of the best players in the country and everyday we come and practice (against them), and it’s like we’re playing at the highest level. So even with or without the reserve games, we’re always playing against a high-level of players.

Brian: Lastly, I know there are a lot of ACC (Atlantic Coast Conference) guys here. I know that Chris and Kyle are Duke guys, and Ryan, I know you’re a Wake Forest guy. Is there a lot of teasing going between the guys from the ACC?

Ryan: Not really, I’ve played against these guys for the past four years and I’ve also played on summer league teams with them and stuff like that so even before we got here, we’ve had friendships being built in the process. It’s also just, before we stepped on the field we’d say ‘hey’ to them but once we stepped onto the field, we’re battling, and right as we stepped off the field, after the game, we’d go up to each other and catch up real quick. But I mean, right now, I believe Wake is leading this team with four guys on it, so Duke’s right behind us with three.
Kyle: But the three of us can take the four of them.

Chris: I’d definitely say that at least once a week, there’s some sort of little comment between each other, whether it’s them making it to the Final Four or us not, or us beating them in the ACC championship. I mean look at it for next year’s college team, Duke’s number two (in NCAA college soccer) in the country going in, Wake’s number four and both are number one and number two in the ACC,. All four years that I was there (at Duke) it was a tough rivalry (between the two schools). In my opinion, those (Duke and Wake Forest) are two of the colleges that play the best soccer in the ACC. I would like go down, all of us go down, and watch the Duke-Wake game whether it’s a regular season game or the ACC tournament. I’d like for all of us to go down there. I think it would be a good time.

Brian: Maybe you want to jump in there and say something Ryan…

Ryan: Yeah, every now and then you hear Marshall (Leonard) or Adam (Cristman) trying to say something about University of Virginia (another ACC school) but they’re starting to fall off.

Kyle: Like this guy (Ryan), I’ve been playing against him for the past 6-7 years; I mean we used to play against one another in high school so we always battled. So people talk about us coming here and battling Beckham, but there’s no battle like the Duke-Wake battle, you know? There’s no battle like that. So we’re ready for the (Galaxy) game. We’re excited about it and hopefully we can get a win.

Game 1: Boy(s) Meet World

So much for adding to that 500 franchise goal mark the Revolution has so prominently featured on its official website.

The Revs, who mere months ago sent Chicago packing after eliminating them for the Eastern Conference semi-finals last October, were shut out by a Fire club that pocketed an early goal in the 4th minute and never looked back, taking the 1-0 result from the boys in blue.

New England amazingly started three rookies (Adam Cristman, Gary Flood and Wells Thompson) to kick off the 2007 season, due in large part to injuries to Shalrie Joseph and Michael Parkhurst. Minutes into the game, they already had their backs to the wall early on after Fire defender Logan Pause Swiss-cheesed the New England defenders and found himself in the right place at the right time by shimmying a weak shot just out of the reach of Revs ‘keeper Matt Reis.

From there on out, it was a parade of missed chances for the Revs, who came oh-so tantalizingly close to equalizing on ensuing occasions.

Minutes after the Pause goal, Andy Dorman would send in a cross from the right wing that Taylor Twellman, normally exceptional on headers, uncharacteristically ricocheted just wide of the net. Later in the first half, Dorman would again send in a bouncing cross that missed not one, but two Revs players, as Cristman and Twellman, as if choreographed, both simultaneuously missed getting a heel on.

In the 2nd half, Twellman rocketed a shot that just pounded off the crossbar and high into cold Chicago air. Later, it would be Fire keeper Matt Pickens who withstood a couple of shots from Dorman. Twellman would be robbed by Pickens after making a smothering save on TnT’s free kick in the 81st minute.

The Revs, seemingly snake-bitten after coming up short more times than Susan Lucci at the Daytime Emmys, lowered their heads in defeat, and conceded their first match of the season to their bitter Eastern Conference rivals.

*Steve Nicol threw his young charges to the Fire without hesitation, by starting Cristman up front with Twellman, Flood at right back, and Thompson at midfield. After Pause’s early goal, a sequence in which Flood looked somewhat tentative, all three rooks held themselves fairly well. Cristman seemed to find himself in the mix on a handful of scoring opportunities, while Thompson admirably flowed through midfield traffic to find open space, as well as locating goal-crashing teammates.

*Although the rookies played well, the game itself reeked of 2006. Missed chances, early holes, and the accompanying goose egg must have given Revs fans flashbacks of many of last year’s matches. However, to Nicol’s credit, the substitution of Flood, a defender, for Arsene Oka, a midfielder who also moonlights as a forward on occasion, may have raised a few eyebrows – in a good way. Obviously, Nicol was playing for the equalizer – duh – but did so in a refreshingly unconventional way by threw an untested, but exciting, rookie into a pressure situation, instead of going the safe route by inserting a veteran sub.

*Call it Year One of a Youth Revolution. Despite the 0-1 ending, the fact that four Revolution rookies all made their MLS debuts was exciting. Cristman, Thompson and Oka all had impressive preseasons, and it was fantastic to see each get their chance in a heated (figuratively), early-season match in frosty Chicago. Flood, called into a starting gig with Michael Parkhurst injured, did a good job to bottle up the Fire attack after the Pause goal, and dispersed some very fancy feeds. Although much too early to cast judgment, the supplemental pick could very well be a fine defender in this league before long. Don’t let the score distract you; this was a very encouraging preview of coming attractions.

*Somebody must have dropped the ball on the regional TV coverage because Revs fans in RI faced the same result as the Revs Saturday night: they were shut out. With TV38 – a station unavailable to Cox subscribers in RI – now carrying Revs games this season, the expectation was that there would be an arrangement made between the club, TV38, and Cox to ensure that the game would be available in Little Rhody. Oh, it was – some 21 hours after the final whistle. Cox showed the game on Cox Channel 3 on Sunday night at 7pm, which technically, did illustrate that Cox3 was indeed able to work out an arrangement with TV38. Unfortunately, the caveat that the game be broadcast live was apparently overlooked.

*They say that the best-officiated games are the ones in which you don’t notice the arbiters. This truism was certainly applicable to Saturday night’s match, as referee Baldomero Toledo oversaw a well-officiated match despite the tenacious air between the two teams. Credit is especially due for calling the dodo bird six-second rule on the Fire after Pickens held onto the ball well beyond the allotted six seconds a keeper can seize the ball for. The call gave the Revs a free kick in the 81st minute at a very opportune time.

*The question begs to be asked: When will the Revs get a home date for the season opener? A trend that is quickly becoming steeped in tradition, the Revs have now opened the season on the road every year since their inception. One has to wonder what the motives are behind this rather alarming statistic that keeps the Revs on the road once the season commences. Surely, this can only reinforce the theory that the Revolution has indeed become the unofficial stepchild of MLS.

*The Revs outshot the Fire 18 to 11, but were outdone by one in terms on shots on goal, 6 to 5. Nevertheless, this was a game that the Revs could have not only easily tied, but won, had they capitalized on just a couple of their numerous chances. Overall, the game was encouraging on many different fronts (tactics, rookies, solid chances), and should be no cause for any Revs player or fan to hang his or her head on.