PDA-Hibernians program to bring new opportunities to Mercer County
HAMILTON » For Dan Donigan, it’s the realization of a goal. For Mercer County players, it’s a chance to stay together and forge a possible pathway to the highest level of youth soccer.
It is the formation of the PDA-Hibernians, a Mercer County-based youth soccer program that has merged the Hibernian Athletic Association with the Players Development Academy. The new club, which was formerly PDA-South and based in Westhampton, is now under the same umbrella as PDA-Shore and PDA-North, with the latter being an actual academy.
The full scope of PDA falls under U.S. Soccer with academy level teams. Much of that criteria are based on coaches, facilities and players. This makes the Hibernians one of the few true area academy level programs, along with the New York Red Bulls, Philadelphia Union and North Jersey’s Cedar Stars. PDA has been one of the highest ranked clubs nationally, based on the youth national team players it has produced and national championships it has won, along with its success on the academy development side of things.
The PDA-Hibernians, which began training on Aug. 1, will play at the Hibos Club in Hamilton Township and Donigan is the club’s technical advisor. In that role, the Rutgers coach will oversee the training schedule, identify academy-quality players, set the soccer curriculum and hire the staff. Many of the staffers will be big names from within and around the area.
“I’ve always had an interest to build my own club and to start my own club, especially since I’ve moved back to New Jersey,” said Donigan, a Steinert grad who coached the University of St. Louis prior to Rutgers. “I started with the Rutgers Soccer Academy Fire and I basically created my club through my camp operation.
“The team fell under my camp umbrella business, but it was always hard to expand because of my priorities with Rutgers. I’ve always had close contact with PDA and recruited a lot of their players. I told them I had this club, the Hibernians, told them all about it and PDA loved it. They offered me to take over the PDA South affiliate. It’s a lot easier for me to take over a club like PDA, with the reputation and members they have, than for me to try and get a club off the ground myself.”
One of the promises made to PDA, is that the Hibernians would install a turf field, which is a must with all the games that will be played on it. Assemblyman Wayne DeAngelo, now in his third year as HAA president, is confident the turf field will happen.
“Turfing out the field is in the plan,” DeAngelo said. “You have to have turf with that number of teams. You need to have stability with your field so if it’s raining you can still have games and practice. That’s gonna come. That has to come.”
PDA Executive Director Gerry McKeown feels the move is a plus for his program.
“There is a tremendous opportunity, given the staff that has been assembled, to bring a program that will attract and retain talented players from that community,” McKeown said. “We recognize that there is a lot of talent in the (Mercer County) area and envision someday that the Hibernian program can be as successful as the PDA parent club.”
There will be 15 boys teams in the first year of PDA-Hibernians — 10 that were in existence and will continue to play at Westhampton, and five that Donigan has formed. That set-up is for the transition year, and things will change as more organization takes place. The long-term plan is to bring girls teams into the fold (PDA has one of the nation’s top girls’ programs), and this year there are still existing Hibernian teams playing regular travel soccer.
Donigan and DeAngelo both felt it was important to get some type of club in the area, as numerous Mercer County players are fragmenting and going separate ways in order to play higher level soccer. In order to keep Mercer’s best together, Donigan is pointing out that this is a direct pathway to an academy team. Since the three programs share players, someone from PDA-Hibernians may be lent to the PDA-North Academy team. And Donigan is hoping his club will gain academy status down the line.
“I just felt inclined to offer this opportunity to those families and players who are interested in taking time to take their game to the next level,” said Donigan, who’s aided by Director of Coaching Paul Tanimae, a coach with the former PDA-South. “There’s a lot of opportunities out there. This is just one, but obviously I have a little bit of a biased opinion toward it, this is what I chose for my son. Hopefully people see the benefit to it.
“Everybody’s different. Everybody makes decisions for different reasons. I’m pretty confident once people see what we’re doing, what we offer, what this can do for their kids’ development in terms of continuing their pathway to a higher level, I’m very confident more people will come on board. We just have to manage it to where we’re not growing so fast that we water down the quality of the play and the quality of the training and the coaching.”
Donigan wants this to be a permanent place for Central Jersey players to call home. He jokes that when he recruits a player to Rutgers, they have 10 different club jerseys hanging in their closet.
“People are fickle,” Donigan said. “They jump from club to club. There are no loyalties, no simple ‘Pick a club and stay with that club and trust and have faith in it.’ My standpoint is you have to basically qualify yourself. Have a trust and belief that you’re doing the right things and you’re developing kids and providing a great environment.
“That’s where I think we’ll get ahead of the game with this PDA Hibernian thing. I’ll get good people around me and we’re gonna provide great opportunities and people are gonna see it and they’re gonna come.”
DeAngelo feels that “This is probably the most exciting thing I’ve seen in six years with the Hibos. We’ve had State Cup teams, we’ve had national Futsal championship teams but the fluctuation between the level of teams was always big and broad. This allows us to have access to trainers, coaching ideas, players. We’re gonna bring this club up to the next level.”
Follow Rich Fisher on twitter @fish4scores