Inside Manny Martins’ Vision for USU Soccer’s Success
From his days painting the lines on the field and moving the benches as a humble assistant at Los Angeles Mission College in 2001, to helping recruit the best class the University of Oregon women’s soccer team has ever assembled in 2019 as an associate head coach, Manny Martins is well acquainted with the college coaching industry.
Now he believes he’s ready to take the next step forward, becoming the head soccer coach at Utah State, replacing Heather Cairns — who stepped down after 18 years at the helm.
The Portugal native, who is just the second minority to be hired as a Utah State head coach in program history – a fact he didn’t know until his wife, Lorena, read him the press release of his hiring – plans to build upon the culture Cairns established, by fielding a team that comes together to be the most relentless team on the pitch.
“I want opponents to be miserable coming to play in Logan,” he said. “(We want) to control all moments of the game.”
This mentality doesn’t seem to be first nature to Martins but rather gained over time.
Living in Portugal until he moved to California in 1993, he learned to admire what is called, the beautiful game, where having possession and being the most stylistic team on the field is all the rave. But at some point in his coaching journey – which began when he was hired as an assistant at his alma mater Sylmar High School in California in 1996 – he came to realize trying to be the team with the most swagger won’t get it done.
“I appreciate (the beautiful game) but you know I also have been around long enough to understand that you don’t always control what the style of play is like,” he said. “So, style of play is not the priority or the focus but rather our team identity. And our play and identity are that we want to be a team that’s fit to play and compete for up to 100 and 10 minutes … a team that plays with confidence and on the front foot.”
This aggressive mentality should fit nicely with the team Martins is inheriting. The Aggies – who started four underclassmen in the abbreviated 2020-21 season, thus having plenty of young talent for him to work with – showed they have the competitive spirit to align nicely with his vision.
After starting the season 0-3, USU won five of their seven finals games over Mountain West opponents to finish the season 5-4-1. Cairns told The Herald Journal their ability to turn their season around was a credit to the team’s resiliency.
Martins noted their competitiveness as an attraction for accepting the position. But he also recognizes it is his job to help his athletes maintain this ambition, and further build USU into a consistent winner. Being part of several different winning teams in his previous coaching stints, Martin believes he can do it.
While at Los Angeles Mission College, the team won a conference championship and finished with a No. 3 ranking in the nation for junior college. Martin was an assistant on the 2012 UCLA team that made it to the NCAA quarterfinals.
He’s been involved with the U.S. women’s national team, being a scout and analyst for the 2019 world cup champions, while also assisting the 2016 U17 and 2020 U20 teams that both won World Cups. As an associate head coach for Oregon, he helped the Ducks reach as high as No.14 in the nation in 2019.
Throughout all his different coaching experiences, Martins has identified one attribute all the successful programs had.
“Having an environment where there’s truly an investment in student athletes’ success – meaning everything is done with the objective of putting them in a position where they can do their best work,” he said.
One key way to create this environment where student-athletes can optimize their ability is to build a culture of inclusiveness, something Martins plans on instilling.
“I want to create an environment where our student-athletes can be their authentic selves without fear of any persecution or judgment and create an environment where we actually celebrate those differences and celebrate their authenticity and look for and find the strengths and the positives in those differences that are going to make us stronger,” Martins said. “For me, it’s my responsibility to one, define what that looks like, and two, module it. And if I can do that then they should be alright.”
Moving to the United States from Portugal as a teenager, Martins understands the importance of accepting people’s differences, because he’s experienced discrimination firsthand.
“As a Black man, I don’t see myself as a victim in any way shape or form but I’ve encountered certain challenges in my life along the way that were a byproduct of what I look like,” he said.
Despite having these gratuitous difficulties in life, Martins has managed to flourish thus far in his coaching career and hopes his efforts can inspire others under similar circumstances to achieve success.
And he isn’t just successful. He’s a groundbreaker. Martins is officially the first minority to be a head coach of any Utah State sport in the 21st century. The first and last minority USU coach was volleyball coach Marlon Sano in 1993. Frank Maile, who is Polynesian, head coached the football team for the end of the 2020 season, but never removed the interim tag.
His background and experiences will give Martins – who is fluent in Portuguese, Spanish, English and Creole – a unique perspective leading and influencing a team whose current roster consists of athletes from a variety of ethnic, geographic and social backgrounds.
And hopefully, in turn, the athletes will continue to be team-first individuals, and develop the relentless and confident identity that Martins envisions.