To say Eric Luzzi, men’s soccer assistant coach, grew up breathing soccer would be an accurate statement.

The son of an Illinois High School Soccer Coaches Association hall-of-famer – not to mention his high school coach – Luzzi has been around the game his entire life.

From his high school days in Chicago at St. Ignatius playing goalie for his father, to his college career at St. Mary’s (Minn.), to all his coaching stops, Luzzi covers it all.

Northern Star: Talk about growing up in a soccer family environment.

Eric Luzzi: It was cool, but it was hard. He was my high school coach, he was a teacher of mine in high school. You know how it is. He’s always tougher on his own kid. It was good for me looking back, but there was a lot of times going through it that I didn’t like it.

NS: What’s the earliest soccer memory you have?

EL: Probably 6. And I played goalie from the time I was 6. If you’ve seen me run over any sort of a distance, it would make a lot of sense. I’ve got the height, but that wasn’t my thing. My thing was more communication. That was my thing. Probably because I grew up around it, I kind of understood things. I could anticipate what was coming. I knew the game probably a little bit better than your average 15- to 16-year-old. So my whole thing was communicating and organizing. So I didn’t have to make as many saves, hopefully.

NS: Was your dad a soccer player?

EL: No. It just wasn’t around. He was a second-year teacher – this was around 1970 – and the athletic director was like, you know, there are a couple other schools that are starting this soccer thing. But when you do it for 35 years, you eventually start to know what you’re doing.

NS: Did your dad get you into playing goalie?

EL: No, actually. I think what got me going was the fact that I was tall. When I was 6, I was the tallest kid in the class, and that’s what they did, put the tallest kid in the goal.

NS: You’ve been working and coaching with the Olympic Development Program, both the Illinois team and the U.S. Soccer Federation’s Region II camp (which is held at NIU). What have those experiences been like?

EL: It’s awesome. You’re talking about the best of the best. Or high school-aged kids, and there’s a lot at stake for them. It doesn’t take a lot to motivate them. They’re working hard for you all the time.

Every summer, the different age groups have summer camps. They start it at the state level, and all the states bring their all-star teams to this four- or five-day camp.

Almost everybody you’re working with at the regional level is gonna be an eventual Division I athlete, and a good number of them are probably gonna be eventual pros. So soccer is a massive factor in their life. You don’t have to worry about motivating them, you can just make them better. You can just coach.

NS: You were in France this summer with the regional team, as a goalkeeper coach and assistant coach. Talk about that.

EL: I’d never been to France. I’ve been to England a couple times. I’ve been to Denmark. The whole experience was awesome. The only thing missing was the fact it was the summertime, so there was no pro stuff going on.

It was Easter weekend. It was cool, but the town we were in was tiny. There was no outside access, no Internet. Anytime you can go hangout in a different culture, it’s cool. You learn some things and get to appreciate your culture even more.

NS: How much pride do you take in one of your goalies setting an NCAA record last year?

EL: The way we do things here, it’s a total group effort. Coach sets the philosophy, ingrains it in the guys that we’re gonna take pride in our defending. We try to work a lot with the goalkeepers on communication and organization, and you put it all together and we were able to do some of the things we did last year. It’s certainly something I’m proud of.