Senior captain, Steve Bartkowski, feels his final season is "personal" as Red Dragons look to bounce back at the start of SUNYAC play
As you open the SUNY Cortland men’s soccer guide you’ll find senior captain, Steve Bartkowski, listed as number thirteen. A number commonly associated with bad luck.
“My birthday is April 13th. I love when people say 13 is unlucky because I think it’s the luckiest number in the world,” a chuckling Bartkowski exclaimed.
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| Via Cortlandreddragons.com |
At a very young age a passion was born for the soccer star at Kenmore East high school.
“When I was about 4 years old, my parents enrolled me in little kids play, and it just kept going from there. At Kenmore East we were a winning team, winning a few sectional titles, the winning aspect of it all increased my love for the game.”
Soccer comes as second nature for the sport management major that spent his pre-college years growing up in Buffalo, New York where he was a member of the high honor roll and graduated in the top-10 percent of his class at Kenmore East as a two year starter in varsity soccer. Bartkowski has been a member of the SUNY Cortland men’s soccer team for all four years he’s spent at Cortland. The decision to enroll at SUNY Cortland came in convincing fashion once the defensemen-stepped foot at the Red Dragons home field.
“The first time I visited Cortland, one of the first things I did with Coach Hornibrook was take a tour of the stadium. Just seeing the atmosphere, the whole stands; it brought me to the field. It brought me to Cortland.”
In his freshmen year of 2009, Bartkowski played in 13 games. “It was an interesting season during my freshmen year because it’s a completely different game coming from the high school to college level. It’s faster, more physical, “ says Bartkowski.
The 2008 season was one in which Bartkowski could have never imagined. He played in 19 games and started in 11 as the Red Dragons won the SUNYAC championship, finishing the season ranked 17th nationally going 11-7-3 after earning a win in the NCAA Division III playoff opener over Misericordia, 1-0. It was the first time since 2003 that the Red Dragons men’s soccer had appeared in the NCAA Division III playoffs.
“That was a huge season for me as well as all the others on the team. The beginning of the season was kind of slow, just as this season has so far right now. As the season went on, we kept building, building, and building, and when we got to the SUNYAC playoffs everything fell into place. Everything went our way, bounces went in our favor, we won in penalty kicks in the semifinals and it just led us to the title. It was just an awesome feeling,” says Bartkowski.
After reaching the top of the summit from a team standpoint in 2008 season, Bartkowski had a personal setback in the 2009 campaign. A broken arm derailed a portion of Bartkowski season appearing in 17 games as well as starting in 11 as the Red Dragons finished at a record of 5-9-3.
Approaching his final season as a member of the Red Dragons Bartkowski feels it’s an honor to be chosen as a captain claiming, “It’s a huge, huge privilege, it was voted on by the players of the team. It’s nice to see the players looking up to me and seeing me as a role model on and off the field.”
Bartkowski feels it is imperative to show the SUNYAC conference that the 2008 season was no fluke emphatically saying, “This year is really important. Our team goes from winning the SUNYAC Championship two years ago to losing in the SUNYAC quarterfinals last year, just a disappointing year overall. We have around ten seniors on this team this year, with seven of them starting. We want to show everyone that we are not a joke team in the SUNYAC’s.”
The SUNY Cortland men’s soccer team may not get all the press on campus, but
Bartkowski believes the team is coming together.
“The team morale is great. Going into the season is always tough because we only have a week and half of preseason, then we get right into games, with freshmen and sophomores not adjusted to their roles. Coming into preseason in the second day, we had a spaghetti dinner, we’ve gone out as a team for miniature golf. Everyone is coming together; we are building that bond on-and-off the field,” says Bartkowski.
The senior captain who idolized Zinedine Zidane growing up is hopeful that his final season as a Red Dragon is capped off with a SUNYAC title saying, “We want to win the SUNYAC’s. It’s personal basically now, especially since I’m a captain, it’s personal that we do well this year.”
The Red Dragons started off SUNYAC play on Saturday vs. Oswego at home as their quest towards a conference title begins.
Asked if he will use the art of flopping as an integral part of his game after watching the act perfected in the 2010 World Cup, Bartkowski laughingly claims “Absolutely not. I hate flopping more than anything.”
For more student athlete interviews tune into Around the Dragon every Friday from 2-4 p.m. with Michael Millstein and Steve Cuce for everything Cortland sports on WSUC 90.5 FM and www.cortland.edu/wsuc.
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