Eleven Lincoln Southeast soccer players received Academic All-State honors this spring, including (top row from left) Damien Tran, Chris Jensen and Ben Crotteau; (middle row) Reis Jensen, Jacob Miller, Tyler Vander Woude and Tim Goldsmith; and (bottow row) Tyler Messersmith and Ryan Rediger.
Three of the seniors on the Lincoln Southeast boys soccer team plan to study engineering in college.
That doesn’t come as a surprise to Southeast coach Michael Rozsa for two reasons. First, there are several good students on the team. Second, in soccer, the players must work together to find a way to get past the defense and score.
“We got guys who like to solve problems and figure things out, and that’s a very cool thing,” Rozsa said.
Tim Goldsmith will attend Michigan and study aerospace engineering. Tyler Messersmith is going to UNL for architectural engineering. Chris Jensen will study mechanical engineering at UNL.
For Lincoln Northeast seniors Annie Nguyen, Brianna Roenne and Sidney Yant, tennis could often make staying on top of classwork challenging.
Those three are among an impressive 11 players on the Southeast boys soccer team who were selected for Journal Star Academic All-State honors based on their accomplishments in both school and soccer. Seven of those players have a grade-point average of at least 4.2.
The others chosen were seniors Yushin Gossin, Reis Jensen, Ryan Rediger and Maxim Sokolov; and juniors Jacob Miller, Damien Tran, Ben Crotteau and Tyler Vander Woude.
Goldsmith excelled in school and soccer. He ranks No. 2 in his class of 503 students. He was on the varsity soccer team all four years and made the all-city soccer team as a midfielder in his sophomore and junior seasons.
For a long time, he’s been interested in reading and learning about space, and he’ll study aerospace engineering.
“I think what I’m most interested in is spacecraft design, like rockets or orbiting spacecraft, like the international space station,” Goldsmith said.
A career goal of his is to work for NASA.
Messersmith will study architectural engineering in college.
“I’ve always been interested in architecture and construction,” Messersmith said. “I love houses, and that’s what I want to do. I want to help build homes for Lincoln.”
Messersmith already has nine college credit hours after taking AP classes in history, psychology and government.
Having so many smart players on the team helps during matches, Rozsa said, because the team can easily switch formations.
“One of the great things about soccer is it really relies on the creativity of the group, and it relies on the players figuring things out because we don’t have timeouts where you can say, ‘OK, here is what you got to do,’” Rozsa said. “My time to talk to them is before the game, at halftime and after the game.”
Full list of honorees
Student-athletes from nearly 250 schools across the state are being honored by the Lincoln Journal Star for Academic All-State.
Northeast girls tennis seniors
For Lincoln Northeast seniors Annie Nguyen, Brianna Roenne and Sidney Yant, tennis could often make staying on top of classwork challenging.
Millard West senior Kaedyn Odermann
“I considered Nebraska strongly, but I’ve always been a big believer in the 40-year plan, not the four-year plan."
Lincoln Southwest’s Lindsey Blehm
For Lincoln Southwest’s Lindsey Blehm, the coronavirus affected more than her final high school track and field season.
Lincoln East girls basketball
The Spartans were team-driven en route to a Class A runner-up finish in 2020. The sum of parts approach shows academically, too.
Millard North's Max Murrell
His teammates have been pegged with Division I basketball offers, and his sister graduated high school in three years.
Kearney senior Miko Maessner
The all-state senior football player and boys 100- and 200-meter state champion knows attending Princeton goes far beyond the athletic spectrum.
Lincoln Southeast boys soccer
Eleven players on the Southeast boys soccer team were selected for Journal Star Academic All-State honors, seven of which have 4.2 GPA or higher.
Crete girls basketball
Led by Morgan Maly, all five starters on the state champion Crete girls basketball team also excelled in school and two other sports.
Lincoln North Star senior Carly Dembowski
Like she does in the batting cages, Carly Dembowski puts in the extra time on the assignments to break slumps in the classroom.
Lincoln Southwest baseball
13 Southwest baseball players received academic all-state honors — a number that is a source of pride for head coach Mitch Vernon.
Fillmore Central senior Halle Theis
Fillmore Central’s Halle Theis knows both athletics and academics will be tougher in college, but Theis up for the challenge.
Reach the writer at 402-473-7435 or bwagner@journalstar.com. On Twitter @LJSSportsWagner.
Brent Wagner
Husker volleyball/women's basketball reporter
Brent has worked at the Journal Star for 14 years. His beats include Nebraska volleyball, women's basketball and high school soccer and cross country.
