Maize boys’ soccer captain Roman Schmidt has a lot on his plate, from maintaining a 3.865 GPA to owning his own lawn and landscaping company. That amount of work outside the playing field hasn’t stopped him from playing competitive club soccer, however. “Last winter, I was involved in a highly competitive club team. I played for the 2006 age group for the club FC Wichita. We played in a league called ECNL (Elite Clubs National League) with some of the best teams in the midwest,” Schmidt said. His goals coming into the season were “to score a couple of goals from a defensive position, and to be a confident and powerful leader on the team.”
Schmidt has been a varsity player for all 4 years of high school, including a start in the state semi-final game as a freshman. Maize had a tough season in his final year, with 7 of their 10 losses coming by one goal, and another two coming by two goals. Nonetheless, Schmidt found positives in his senior season- “As a team, obviously we wanted to win. We encouraged each other to give our all at each and every game. The season went ok, it started off pretty shaky but as time went on, we definitely built chemistry and confidence as a team. We slowly started matching the play level of high caliber teams, but sadly we lost most games by only one or two goals, very close and winnable games.”
After high school, Schmidt plans to get a business degree while continuing to grow his business.
