Superintendent Jeff Beckworth “Hands On” In His Role As Woodland High Head Boys’ Soccer Coach

By Billy G. Baker

Publisher

Dorchester — The familiar drive down Highway 78, on the way to Woodland High in Dorchester County, remains a two- lane venue, dominated by dense Pined woods adjacent to the Norfolk Southern train tracks that deliver goods from the massive inland port in Greer; every day to the port of Charleston.

The purpose of the drive is to meet Woodland High’s new head boys’ soccer coach, Jeff Beckworth, who just happens to also be the Dorchester Four Superintendent of Education.  Beckworth is a former college soccer player from Chowan College in North Carolina where he came South from New York back in the day to fulfill his goal of playing college soccer, and also to get a college education.

Arriving on the campus of Woodland High on February, 29 it is 79 degrees at 4:45 in the afternoon and Spring sports teams can be seen working out all over the land scape. The teams look vibrant, alive, energized, and hundreds of student athletes are being mentored by their coaches. Driving towards the football stadium, we can see “Coach Beckworth” busy working out 18 varsity soccer players on the turf of the football stadium.

Not too far away the Woodland High baseball team is fully engaged, putting on a pre-season Wooden bat tournament involving 12 teams under the direction of Wolverines head coach Keith Lowman. The track teams (under the direction of Chaves James) are working out 120 boy’s and girl’s track candidates, and the girls’ soccer team (coached by Wendy Lynn Riley and Andrea Stanley) is busy practicing on a near-by field with another 20 student athletes. 

The softball practice, with Kim Reeves pitching batting practice in the cage, is a blend of 40 junior varsity and varsity candidates.  Hannah Reeves is back home from having finished college and she is “live pitching” very hard to batters on the softball field.

With all that is going on this is the greeting from Coach Beckworth when he approaches him at soccer practice: “Thought about having a drone fly over and getting some video of all our student athletes and coaches preparing their teams to participate in Spring sports,” he said greeting this reporter. “Isn’t this great. It looks like we have 50 per cent of our student body out here this afternoon.”

It was a decade ago that Coach Beckworth was an elementary Principal in the area when he started a hugely popular elementary school soccer program at his school.  After getting the soccer program started, he left for a few years, to pursue other educational opportunities. So, last April when he was named Superintendent in DD-4, he just knew in the back of his mind he would enjoy reuniting with many of his former elementary soccer players, who were now juniors and seniors in high school, by becoming the head soccer coach. It just seemed like the right thing to do.

The 2024 Woodland High soccer team is comprised of 18 players and it is made up of six seniors, six juniors and six sophomores. They were scheduled to play in a soccer pre-season tournament hosted by Whale Branch Feb., 29-March, 2, as the HSSR was going to press.

Coach Beckworth explained why he feels it is important to get out and mingle with student athletes in his role as Superintendent in DD-4. “It is all about being hands on and there is no better way to understand what the needs are of your school district then being right in the thick of things,” said Coach Beckworth. “Being out here, working with the soccer team amongst our other dedicated coaches working with their student athletes is a very positive and meaningful endeavor.

“Right now, on the track, Coach Chaves James is working with 120 track athletes and his teams compete for championships year-end and year-out,” said Coach/Superintendent Beckworth. “The track team is hosting an event here this weekend involving 35 teams from all over the state with 1,400 athletes coming to our campus. Student athletes will come out and participate in sports when the coaches are good and we have some excellent coaches in all our sports at Woodland High School.” 

“Our baseball team (head coached by veteran Keith Lowman) has been hosting a Wooden bat tournament the past week with 14 teams involved,” said Coach Beckworth. “There has been a lot of activity on our baseball field.   

“Our girls’ soccer team is busy getting ready for the season and they are coached by Wendy Lynn Riley and Andrea Stanley.” said Coach Beckworth. “Our softball team is over there working hard right now and they under the direction of Kim Reeves once again.

“I can’t say enough about our hard-working athletic director Ty Sibert. We will be starting a new wrestling program next year and he will be the head coach.”

Turning back to boys’ soccer; what are the goals and expectations for the boys’ soccer team this season? “You always want to compete for a region title first and foremost,” said Coach-Superintendent Beckworth. “You hope to advance past the region and compete well in the playoffs also. Success will build continuity in the program.

“Right now, we have a lot of younger kids on the varsity and we have several good players coming along in our middle school soccer program right now,” said Coach Beckworth. “We need good feeder programs to be able to replace seniors when they graduate. Our varsity team this year is spread out evenly between seniors, juniors and sophomores. We have a good group of kids to work with on the varsity.”

Coach Beckworth cited the names of a few of the players he helped introduce to the sport of soccer when he worked at the local elementary school a few years back. “Current players like Sideek Neals, Keyonta Britt. Alquan Cobbs, and Chance Green are a few of the players I was involved in earlier and it is great to see that they have stuck with the sport,” said Coach Beckworth. “Many of these athletes also travelled around with me in AAU basketball in the summers.”

Coach Beckworth said he started in the education system as a physical education teacher. “Back in the day, here as a teacher and administrator, I felt it was important to get young students involved in sports because that is how I grew up myself,” said Coach Beckworth.  “It is so important to get young people involved in after school activities, and getting them involved with coaches is so important in helping their over-all development.”

Some of the team’s early soccer matches will come against Charleston Math & Science, Whale Branch, and Timberland and then region play begins. The team will also play Gray Collegiate later in the season.

“The biggest challenge is to get your players to communicate well once they get on the field,” said Coach Beckworth. “They like to talk off the field but not so much on the field. They just kind of make the play and move on right now.”       

The team captains this season are senior marking back Chance Green and senior forward/defender Cooper Glazer. This is Glazer’s first year on the team. “It is a lot of fun playing varsity soccer for the first time and I love running around all the time, never sitting still,” said Glazer who was a quarterback on the football team in the fall. “My goal is to have a good time and win some games.

“Coach Beckworth has taught me how to move my feet better and he has helped me strengthen my legs which are important for soccer,” said Glazer. “He has also worked hard with everyone on the team to improve our conditioning. You have to be in shape to play soccer effectively.”

Co-captain Chance Green started playing soccer in the third grade up in Pennsylvania and he moved to the area in the sixth grade. “I play center back which is the center of the defense,” said Green. “My role is to control the entire defense and observe the entire field from the back side. I communicate with players to tell them where they need to be at on the field.

“My role as co-captain is to be able to make sure my teammates are where they need to be and make sure they are doing what they need to be doing,” said Chance. “We need to make sure that we are keeping good team chemistry and not arguing amongst each other.“

Chance has been on the varsity at Woodland for four seasons. “We had a lot of seniors graduate so we are starting with a lot of younger players, so the only way for us to go is up,” said Green. “Coach Beckworth is doing a great job keeping us focused.”   

The starting goalie for the Wolverines soccer team will be sophomore Giovanni Hernandez. “He started in goal last year as a sophomore so we are excited to have him for the next two years,” said Coach Beckworth. “He is sort of self-taught.”

Hernandez commented after one recent practice to the HSSR, “I first started playing with Coach Beckworth in elementary school,” said Hernandez. “My goal is to see the entire field and prevent goals from being scored. My job is to help out my teammates with good communication skills. I try to help them make the right plays. I have been playing for a long time.”   

The starting group in the midfield will be patrolled by sophomore Brayan Vivas Sanchez, junior Sideek Neals, and senior Jonathan Brown.

The marking backs on defense will be led by junior Keyonta Britt, senior Alquan Cobbs as forward defenders and senior captain Cooper Glazer will hold down a Forward/Defense position.

In the team’s first match of the season (Feb., 27) they played a better competitive game against Charleston Math & Science before losing 1-0. “We found out last night (versus C-M-S) that we have to strengthen the back of our line-up,” said Coach Beckworth. “We are still maneuvering guys around and we didn’t have any scrimmages so last night was our first time playing on a full field. We gave up one goal in the first minute and that was all the scoring there was in the game so we ended up losing 1-0.”

Senior captain Chance Green will be a leader on defense along with Quantez White and Logan Miller.  The fourth defender is still up in the air but Cooper Glazer has played in the back also.  Coach Beckworth indicated he might move Glazer up more on the offense to attack. Alquan Cobbs might also see action in the back also.

“Nobody is really stuck on a certain position this early in the season, so there will be a lot of versatility in our line-up from game-to-game as we look for the right combinations,” said Coach Beckworth.   

Bryson Cummings, is a newcomer junior forward who talked about what he has learned from Coach Beckworth after a recent practice. “He helps us with special skills like dribbling and passing the ball when we are on the run,” said Cummings. “He pushes us to do better every single day in practice. He has been teaching us a lot about how to play soccer at a higher level.”   

Other members of the team include: Sophomore forward Ismael Silva, sophomore mid-fielder Jaiden Dunning, sophomore mid-fielder/forward Jorge Garcia, and sophomore Midfield/Defense performer Jamie McCarthy. Juniors Logan Miller, Quantez White, and Andrew Hayes will support the team on defense.

Chandler Bowman is a senior Defense/Midfield performer and junior Keyshon Westbury will see action in the Midfield while junior Bryson Cummings will hold down a forward spot. 

Next month the HSSR will report on the Woodland High baseball, track, and softball teams and we had a visit with all three coaches recently. Spring is nearing: time to play ball!