Sports

Gurson Hones Soccer Skills with PDL League

Stevenson graduate Gordy Gurson, 20, is spending the summer playing with a new team in the Premier Development League.

Across Buffalo Grove, college students are making their way home, some ready for a summer job, others ready for a few months of relaxation before the next semester begins.

Then there’s Gordy Gurson. He plans to spend the summer on his feet, training to be a “faster and stronger” soccer player as he works toward his goal of playing professionally.

Gurson, who just finished his sophomore year at Robert Morris University, where he plays soccer, is spending the summer playing for the Chicago Inferno team. The team is a new addition to the Premier Development League, which attracts offseason college players as well as former professionals. 

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Gurson, who began playing soccer at age 4, has never strayed from the sport. Over the years, he’s played for recreational leagues, traveling teams and at , from which he graduated in 2010.

As a child, he also played baseball and basketball, but by the time he reached high school, he had decided to put all of his athletic efforts into soccer.

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“I knew I had no chance at basketball, only being 5-foot-6-inches,” he said. “Soccer I was always more into than anything else.”

His commitment and skill have not gone unrewarded. The Buffalo Grove native was named to the 2011 and was 2011 Chicagoland Collegiate Athletic Conference Player of the Year.

In January, he was the first player recruited for the Chicago Inferno.

“It was definitely risky, but with everything I’d heard of the coach … I know the background was going to be good,” said Gurson, the team's forward. The Premier Development League, he said, “is like the minor leagues of baseball, pretty much.”

“I’m hoping to get myself better. This is more of a professional atmosphere, where we’re playing every day, and if we’re not playing, we’re training,” he said.

Gurson said he puts four hours a day into soccer, arriving to practice early and staying late to hone his skills.

“I definitely see improvements already,” he said. He said he appreciates the chance to work with different coaches and learn from teammates with a range of experience. The league includes players from 18 to those into their 30s, he said.

The more experienced players “aren’t as fast, but they are smart. They are always in the right place,” Gurson said.

With the preseason behind it, the Chicago Inferno is gearing up for its first game this Saturday against the Michigan Bucks. Gurson’s team will play its first home game of the season on May 25 at Wheaton College. He hopes fans will come to cheer on the Inferno.

In the fall, Gurson will return to Robert Morris University, where he’s majoring in applied health studies. He just earned a spot on the dean’s list for the first time, he said.

Still, soccer remains this student’s main priority.

“I’m definitely going to play one more season” on the college soccer team, he said. His parents hope he’ll finish college, he said, but signing with a professional soccer team is his ultimate goal.

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