After reaching the Iowa Conference tournament last year, the Simpson Storm men’s soccer team has an optimistic outlook on this upcoming season.

Returning 28 out of 31 players after a conference birth last year, the Simpson men’s soccer team is looking forward to advancing even farther this season. Under his second year tenure as Simpson men’s soccer coach, Rick Issacson hopes that their work off season will play off during the course of the season.

“The players were committed to our off season strength and conditioning program,” Issacson said. “When you combine our productive off season as far as improving and the talented incoming class that we brought in, it’s all coming together as we get ready for this season.”

With having a significant number of players returning this season, Simpson looks towards their upperclassman for leadership. Senior Jeremy Reinert looks forward to having success in his final season.

“We’re kind of an underdog this season but we were an underdog last season and we plan to steal games just like we did last season,” Reinert said. “This year we plan to steal conference games just like we did last year, which hopefully will help our chances in achieving a birth to the NCAA tournament.”

Reinert was second in the IIAC in total number of goals last year as a junior.

Junior Luke Aronow will help Simpson’s defense, as the goalkeeper received honorable mention last season. The Storm also look upon last year’s team Newcomer of the Year, Mitchell White, to contribute coming off a strong freshman season.

Making a step forward in the right direction is one of Coach Issacson’s plans this season and he believes has the group of guys to succeed.

“Last season we achieved our goal in making the conference tournament,” Issacson said. “We kicked that door down last year now we plan to take a step forward in the right direction.”

The Storm is two matches into its season with wins against Crown (11-0) and Bethel (MN) (3-0) to put Simpson in a quick 2-0 start.