38 / ’southern
ATHLETICS
After spending nearly a month overseas, BSC’s
longtime Head Men’s Soccer Coach Preston Goldfarb
arrived back on campus in August, and he brought
the global spotlight with him.
Goldfarb led the USA to its first-ever gold medal
in open men’s soccer at the World Maccabiah Games
in Israel, held July 17-30. The team won behind tie-
breaking penalty kicks over international powerhouse
Argentina.
“It is very hard to explain in words just how truly
special this team is,” Goldfarb wrote on his team’s
blog after the historic win. “I’ve had the good fortune
of coaching some incredible players, teams, and
people over my long career, but I have never been
with any group that made me as proud or as honored
to coach them as this team.”
Thousands of Jewish athletes from around
the globe gather in Israel every four years for the
Olympic-style Maccabiah Games, the third-largest
sporting event in the world. This year’s games had
a record with 78 countries competing; 17 countries
participated in the men’s open division for soccer.
In the past 76 years of the World Maccabiah
Games, no USA open men’s soccer team had ever
won the gold. The 1981 and 2005 teams made it
to the finals, but lost in the championship games.
This was Goldfarb’s third time coaching in the
games, having led Team USA at the 18th World
Maccabiah Games in 2009 and the Maccabi Australia
International Games in 2010.
Tryouts for this year’s open men’s soccer team
began in Los Angeles last December. Goldfarb
was on hand to help evaluate the talent for the
field, which ranges from pre-college students
to professional players. Twenty athletes and 10
alternates were selected.
“When we all met for the first time on July 7 in Tel
Aviv, I told the team to dare to dream the impossible,
so they can achieve the possible,” Goldfarb says.
“I told them to leave their egos at the door, and
fortunately, they all bought in to my philosophy
about how we would operate as one. I did not
want to have ‘best players,’ but a team that was the
superstar. Only three of the athletes had ever played
Coaching for gold
Goldfarb leads Maccabi USA Open Men’s Soccer
BY
PAT COLE
