Filling Chay Cain’s cleats

Luis Soffner has more than stopping goals on his mind.

Soffner, a redshirt freshman and IU men’s soccer goalie, has the taxing job of replacing Chay Cain in the box.

Cain, a two-time All-American, now serves as a student assistant coach for the Hoosiers.

Soffner grew up with soccer in his bloodline.

His grandfather, Jim Scott, is the founder of St. Louis’ largest soccer club, the Scott-Gallagher Club.

Since kindergarten, Luis has trained year round, hoping one day he would play in his grandfather’s club.

“Luis always grew up saying ‘I want to play soccer for Papa’s soccer team,’” Soffner’s mother, Julie Soffner, said. “He just didn’t have any doubt at all that what he was going to do was play with all those kids.”

Soffner was given the chance to play for Scott-Gallagher when he was 9 years old.

Former Hoosier forward Pat Noonan and current members Will Bruin, Tommy Meyer and Chris Haffner all trained at the club, which has over 1,000 participants. Luis Soffner also played with Meyer and Haffner during his time at St. Louis University High School.

“Coming from high school into college together was a really nice transition,” Luis Soffner said. “With Tommy right in front of me it’s good, we know exactly what each other does, so we kind of have a little better connection rather than with four new guys back there.”

This long-time goalie recorded 18 shutouts in 23 matches of his senior year and acquired a .32 goals-against average.

During his entire high school career, Cain had 44 career shutouts with a .46 goals-against average.

On the collegiate level, Cain was unpassable in his freshman year, allowing no goals in three matches.

In Soffner’s second match, he allowed two goals.

“Obviously, me and him are completely different players,” Cain said. “I’m about 5’10” and he’s 6’3” or whatever. I’m a little quicker where he kind of controls more of his box.”

Cain said for Luis Soffner to be a successful starter, the rookie will have to show the defense his confidence, but he will not have a problem because “the best thing about Luis is his composure.”

Sitting in the stands during the Sept. 4 match against St. John’s, Julie Soffner was amazed at her son’s display of confidence.

“I’m in awe at how he handles all of this because he does seem very calm, cool and collected,” she said.

Soffner’s debut for the cream and crimson was in that match against the Red Storm in the IU adidas/Credit Union Classic. He started again two days later against Wake Forest. The weekend left Luis Soffner virtually untested at the goal until the second half of the Wake Forest match.

He had six saves and two goals against on the weekend.

Cain said, for the most part, Soffner did his job at the Classic.

“It’s your job to take the pressure off the defense when the ball gets in behind and make all the easy plays,” Cain said. “I don’t think there’s anybody in the country who expects their goalkeeper to make every single save, but as long as you’re doing all the easy things right and then pulling out some of the hard ones.”

IU coach Mike Freitag said he choose Luis Soffner as his starter because of his size and his effectiveness.

“He’s a young man who knows what he wants to do,” Freitag said. “He’s just a good-hearted person who seems to always be in a good mood and is a talented goalkeeper.”

Luis Soffner might have a solid soccer background, but he has a lot to learn to fill Cain’s previous role.

“His biggest issue is going to be to make sure he’s playing his own game,” Cain said. “A lot of the strength that he has, I never possessed.”

Although Luis Soffner might never fill Cain’s cleats, he has confidence in himself that he can leave his own positive mark on IU soccer.

“We have the potential to go all the way this year,” Luis Soffner said. “I know that some people underestimate us a little bit, just because we have a lot of young guys, not as many seniors this year and then about me. But I just want them to have confidence in me. I know that I have confidence in me too, so I know the guys are starting to gain confidence in me.”