When John Parente was named head coach of the first-year men’s soccer team at Penn State Altoona in 2001, he was uncertain about starting a program from scratch.

“I wasn’t 100% sure if this was what I wanted to do,” he said. “But I’ve always been a person who didn’t want to have regrets.”

But it didn’t take long for Parente to become excited about the prospects of laying the groundwork to a quality college athletics program.

            “One of the reasons I was happy to come here was that I had the chance to build my own program,” said Parente. “How many jobs do you get to have where you can set the mold for the future?”

            Parente is thankful for the confidence that Fredina Ingold, the Athletics Director at Penn State Altoona, showed in selecting him as the team’s head coach.

            “I feel fortunate that Fredina has trusted my vision of what a soccer program should look like,” said Parente. “On some level, we’ve laid the foundation to this program.”

            Like any young program, the Lions took their lumps during their inaugural season, going 4-11. But the first taste of competition brought an instinctive hunger for more success.

            “I had a blast. I knew this was what I wanted to do,” said Parente. “But I didn’t like winning only four games, so I started recruiting like crazy.”

            Now, eight seasons later, the program won its 100th game against Pitt-Greensburg on October 13, a milestone of which Parente is proud.

            “I’ve always looked at it from a program perspective, and I’m always fighting to try and get credibility for the program and make recruits, families and fans understand that we have a quality soccer team here,” he said. “We got to 100 wins faster than most and have outpaced very established programs during that same time – and we started with nothing.”

            Parente credits a large part of the success of the program to those who have assisted him over the years, such as assistant men’s soccer coach Patrick “Mo” Taylor.

            “In sports, there is a different bond between the players and the assistant coach, and we were able to find someone in Mo who the players just adore,” Parente said. “We have very different styles, but we have been able to bring it all together.”

            Parente also believes that Tim Wassell, head coach of the women’s soccer team at the school, has had a stabilizing effect since the program’s inception.

            “Tim was a volunteer goalie coach in 2003, and then was a star player for us in 2004 and 2005,” said Parente. “In 2006, I asked him to stick around as an assistant, and now he’s a colleague as the women’s soccer head coach.”

            But at the end of the day, Parente knows that the players themselves are the ones who put everything in motion.

            “Ultimately, it is their blood, sweat and tears out on the field,” said Parente. “They play for love of the game.”

            Penn State Altoona men’s soccer has produced 47 All-Conference selections within the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference since the 2001 season. But Parente knows that the experience of playing college soccer can have plenty of off-the-field benefits for the players, too.

            “When I get in touch with old players, I am always amazed by the impact that playing soccer at Penn State Altoona has had on them,” he said. “I talked to two former players recently who are going into business together, and I was pretty moved by the fact that those two guys are lifelong friends because of our soccer program.”