DETROIT LAKES — The Detroit Lakes girls soccer team will be cheering on its senior center midfielder Kaydence Swiers at Concordia College next fall. Swiers signed her national letter of intent to be a Cobber on March 16.
In her career at Detroit Lakes, Swiers finished with seven goals and five assists. Third-year head coach Benjamin Aastuen admired her dedication to becoming the best player she could be.
“Kaydence always worked hard,” he said. “That is one of the reasons she's been so successful. When she joined our soccer program in seventh grade, she came in ready to have fun and work. She has grown into a true leader of our soccer team. Her soccer skills have obviously improved and she became our field general, knowing where to be to influence a play and where to make the best pass to improve our attack.”
As a leader, Swiers got the best out of her teammates. This past season was the best example of how she was able to change the minds of her teammates during the team’s early season struggles.
“She's the best leader,” Aastuen said. “I get emotional talking about this because this last season was very hard on our athletes and our coaching staff. We started the beginning of the season losing our first six or eight games by an overwhelmingly negative score line. In every single one of those games, Kaydence challenged our players to get better, and convinced them that they were better and that better times would come.”
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Under Swiers’ guidance, Aastuen saw a much improved Lakers team.
“They did get better and they did believe in themselves,” he said. “In our first game of the season, we lost to Little Falls 7-0. In our first section playoff game at the end of the season, we beat that same team 1-0. Our seniors really did a lot of heavy lifting to get our team to believe in themselves and make this incredible transition. Kaydence was a huge part of this shift.”
Aastuen is excited to see one of his players continue their soccer career past high school, and can’t wait to see what Swiers’ college career has in store for her.
“I have been coaching varsity now for three years, and I have not had a player move on to the next level. This is exciting for me as I love this sport and my goal is to show a love for soccer. Kaydence has obviously found that love. Our coaching staff is over the moon to see her continue on, and look forward to supporting her at any games we can.”
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