The soccer gods probably owed one to Dave Cosgrove when the Pima College Aztecs reached the 2018 NJCAA menβs soccer championships.
The top-ranked Aztecs had been one of the gameβs four or five leading menβs soccer program for at least a decade, but had been unable to win the Big One.
That close-but-no-happy-ending story was beginning to wear on Cosgrove, a graduate of Amphitheater High School and the UA.
As a PCC sophomore in 1988, Cosgrove was on the field when Mercer Community College of New Jersey beat the Aztecs 1-0 in the national finals.
And as PCCβs head coach in 1999, Cosgrove was again on the turf when State Fair Community College of Missouri beat the Aztecs 3-2 in overtime in the NJCAA championship game. To make it worse, State Fair soon vacated the championship when it was discovered they used several ineligible players.
How close can you get? Cosgroveβs Aztecs had finished No. 3 in the championship finals in 2015 and No. 5 in 2017. Pima had replaced longtime ACCAC kingpin Yavapai College as the leagueβs most successful program about 10 years ago; all that remained was to win it all.
Finally, in November 2018 in Daytona Beach, Florida, Pima won the Big One and all the ones leading up to the national championship game. After finishing the ACCAC season with a school-record 18-2 conference season, Pima won eight consecutive elimination games to become No. 1.
The Aztecs beat Yavapai and Chandler-Gilbert to win the Region championship, then eliminated Laramie Community College and Snow College in the West Region finals.
βI canβt say I saw this coming,β Cosgrove told me before leaving for Florida. βWe lost all but four guys from last yearβs (19-5-3) team, and as you know, this conference is as good as it gets.β
This time Cosgrove and PCC had a little serendipity on their side. Hugo Kametani, an elite talent from Japan, hoped to move to America to play college soccer and get exposure from four-year schools and, ultimately, the pros.
Kametani initially planned to enroll at a Kansas junior college but discovered that PCC had a stronger English as a Second Language program, and chose to move to Tucson a month or so before the soccer season.
Kametani was a game-changer. He became the ACCAC and NJCAA player of the year, scoring a school-record 30 goals, combining with Swiss goalie Nils Roth to become a first-team All-American. After that, Cosgrove surrounded them with the typically strong Tucson talent, including Kaskile Zawadi (Cholla), Martin Cardenas (Sabino), Daniel Suazo (Tucson High) and Alec Nguyen (Sahuaro) as Pima rose to No. 1 in the NJCAA poll in early November.
βThis journey has humbled me,β said Cosgrove. βI have learned that itβs not always talent β and we have talented kids β but also character is a big part of it. This team has the talent and character.β
Once at the NJCAA finals in Florida, the Aztecs peaked.
They routed Muskegon College 5-0 in the opener, beat Northeast Texas College 3-2 on Kametaniβs βgolden goalββ in overtime, and then eliminated New Yorkβs Monroe CC 1-0 in the semifinals as Kametaniβs goal in the 72nd minute made the difference.
The finals against No. 3 Barton CCC was won 2-1 when Kametani scored in the gameβ 106th minute.
βItβs been a long time coming,β said Cosgrove. βWeβve had a lot of terrific players. Weβve had unbelievable support from Pima College over my 30 years here. It feels very good to reward our alumni, reward all the support staff and administration.
βThese kids always found a way to win. It was an unbelievable quality they had.β
Four years later in Wichita, Kansas, Pima College won its second NJCAA title, beating Essex Community College of Maryland in overtime.
A few months later, Pima College was chosen to host the 2022 NJCAA menβs soccer championships. The tournament will run from Nov. 14-22 at Kino North Stadium.
