Conqu'ring Heroes 206 - Chaka Daley Transcript
9/10/2026 4:00:00 AM | MGoBlue Podcasts
Brian Boesch • 00:00
Men's soccer head coach Chaka Daley coming up in about five minutes. But first, our Conqu'ring heroes Sports update all throughout campus. We begin with some history for Michigan men's golf. For the first time in eighteen years, the Wolverines secure back to back team victories. Michigan dominated the twelve team Island Resort Intercollegiate in Bark River, Michigan posting a forty one under over three rounds, fifteen strokes better than second place West Virginia. And individually Michigan finished one two. Freshman Spencer Shropshire's two finished second two back of teammate RJ Arone who earned his first collegiate title with a fourteen under two hundred and two.
RJ Arone • 00:40
Honestly, it was a pretty special feeling. I've been working towards it for a while now, so to see it all that work finally pay off is pretty awesome. I think the biggest thing was just being able to stay patient and trust my game. I knew that I was capable of winning, so actually getting that first one was definitely a relief. But it also gives me a lot of confidence moving forward.
Brian Boesch • 00:57
That young man Arone tied the fourth lowest fifty four hole total in program history as part of the seventh team title under head coach Zach Barlow. Aron believes this can be a launching pad start for the Wolverines.
RJ Arone • 01:10
There's something about going back to back with a fresh team and what it means for the rest of the season. I think that we have a real special thing going and then we can be real contenders for the national championship. Big Tens, anything in our way. But we got to get back on the horse quick because next week we got Inverness.
Brian Boesch • 01:27
Indeed, that trip down to Toledo comes up Sunday through Tuesday, another three round event. You can follow along on mgo blue dot com Also this weekend Jan Dowling and Women's golf opens its fall slate in Madison, a three day Badger Invitational. Same three days Sunday, Monday and Tuesday to volleyball, a successful trip for Erin Virtue's crew to Valparaiso, sweeping Cincinnati on Saturday and defeating host Valpo in four sets on Sunday. Ella Demetrician, the MVP of what was known as the Valpo Popcorn Classic. She finished with her second double double of the season in the win over Valpo, collecting twenty one kills and sixteen digs. Here's Demetrician on the weekend performance.
Ella Demetrician • 02:09
I think we learned a lot this weekend about what we can bring and who we are. It doesn't you know we're going to play some great opponents in the Big Ten, but we just need to bring our best selves to every occasion and I think we did that on against Cincinnati with those gritty twenty eight twenty two six wins. But yeah, I'm super excited to be supported by my teammates and we're just having a lot of fun and we're just gonna keep the ball rolling here.
Brian Boesch • 02:35
So Demetrician and the Wolverines take their five and one record on the road yet again for another two match trip, this time to Tampa. Friday at one o'clock Michigan meets TCU and then Saturday at six o' clock it's a battle with host South Florida. Field hockey now. Last week on Conqu'ring Heroes, head coach Kristi Gannon Fisher mentioned that Michigan's weekend included a pair of must wins from an NCAA Tournament standpoint with non conference home matchups against Kent State and Vermont. Wolverines took care of business as expected. Four zip over the Golden Flashes on Friday and then four to one over Vermont on Sunday. Four different goal scorers in the win over Kent State, then a hat trick from Esmée de Willigen on Sunday. Next up, the homestand continues Friday. It is a five o' clock clash with California. Elsewhere, Cross country the women's team's Michigan Open event in Dexter was canceled due to inclement weather.
Brian Boesch • 03:26
No makeup for that one so the twenty twenty six opener for women's cross country this Friday in East Lansing at the Spartan Invitational. We'll also see the women's tennis team play in the Kitty Harrison Invitational Friday through Sunday down in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Women's soccer hasn't played since last Thursday when Natelle El Mokbel's two goal effort propelled the Wolverines past Georgia Southern three nil with Wolverines dominated in chances nineteen to six in shots. It was scoreless until the sixty seventh minute and Michigan pulled away to get to two, zero and three on the campaign this weekend. The Wolverines with a couple of Big Ten matchups in the state of Illinois. They're at Northwestern Thursday at seven thirty Eastern and then Illinois on Sunday, two o' clock Eastern in that one. As for our featured sport this week, it was looking great for Chaka Daley and Michigan men's soccer for eighty five ish minutes, but Notre Dame rallied for two goals in the final five minutes to stun Michigan on Sunday.
Brian Boesch • 04:24
Two to one. First loss in four tries for a Michigan team that is far from full strength, health wise, but still playing some strong stretches of soccer. Big Ten play begins on Friday night here in Ann Arbor. Perennial power Indiana comes to town. The Hoosiers off to a typical very strong start. Five, zero and one Tickets still available. They're going quickly. MGO blue dot com Tickets seven o' clock on Friday and if you're on the fence, I'M confident that some of Chaka Daley's comments here will fire you up, encourage you to check out his team live Friday night, seven o'. Clock. A great appetizer for Michigan Oklahoma on Saturday. So let's visit with Coach Daley here on this week's episode of Conqu'ring Heroes.
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Jeff Laurence • 05:08
Welcome to your one stop podcast for all things Michigan athletics. Updates on every team on campus and interviews with players and coaches are all on the way. This is Conqu'ring Heroes is your host, Brian Boesch.
Brian Boesch • 05:23
Well, Coach, thanks so much for joining us here today. Let's get the tough part out of the way. And that was what happened on Sunday on the road at Notre Dame. Tough one two to one. It seemed like your team really had control of that one until the final five minutes. Just take us through you as a coach, what you're trying to hold on for late and then hope for a draw and then it ended up being a two to one loss.
Chaka Daley • 05:45
Yes. You know, when you're, when you're playing in games at tough environments away from home, there's a lot of lessons to be learned and you obviously want to try to learn those lessons with a result or win or tie. But unfortunately, we were on the wrong side of it yesterday. We were pretty resilient throughout the course of the game. We worked really hard. We competed really well. We were in a advantageous situation for about eighty four minutes and then in the last six turned on its head a little bit. They have now what's called video review, possibly. You know, it's not my decision to make when it comes down to that, but we need to do a better job of dealing with it as a staff and certainly as student athletes. But it's the first time we encountered something like that with a group that's growing and we're a work in progress. You know, we have a lot of, you know, entertaining young, spirited players.
Chaka Daley • 06:42
Emphasis on young or inexperienced. But, you know, you're not going to learn better lessons than that. You know, going away from home and playing against a good opponent, program with a national championship, a little bit of history. You know, like I said, we'd love to come out of that with, worst case, a point or tie in the road, but lessons learned for the staff and lessons learned for the group, you know, going forward when, when we're in that situation again on the road.
Brian Boesch • 07:08
What can you draw from the first eighty four, eighty five minutes? What was working?
Chaka Daley • 07:14
Yeah. I thought the group was, you know, worked really hard. They defended fairly well. They were really competitive. We used quite a few players it was very warm on an afternoon game, but we used quite a few players, and I think a lot of guys got a little bit of a run in a very important game to the season, and maybe a game that would. Will factor in maybe later, whether they do well or we can, you know, dig another result out, you know, with the RPI and all that good stuff. But I think what we learned was, you know, we have really good potential, you know, and I think we have a chance to get to, you know, that next level that I think what we call a culture of expectation within the group. I think Michigan has that in general, and I think we've created that within the men's soccer program to have a culture of expectation, to find a way to win those games, not to just tie them on the road.
Chaka Daley • 08:06
And I think that's the lesson we learned. And I think the guys realized how close we were, but they also understand the details that matter late in the game when things like that happen. You're tired, you're fatigued. There's a lot of noise, you know, from everywhere. Your other players, fans, coaches. There's a lot of noise. Can you. Can you zero in and find a way to, you know, block that out and be focused on the task at hand?
Brian Boesch • 08:30
Along those lines of culture. I remember hearing you after a couple of seasons ago, it had been a little while since your program had made the NCAA tournament. You talked about kind of resetting or reevaluating everything it has yielded back to back NCAA tournament appearances. With the fact that you have so much youth, how has that culture implementation gone, especially with more of a foundation of success that your program has had over these last couple of years?
Chaka Daley • 08:55
Yeah, you know, when we. We started that, a few years were, you know, coming off of, I think, the backside of COVID and, you know, there's a lot of challenges for a lot of programs around the country. Certainly, we weren't immune to that, but I think we. We graduated some really great young men, but we really needed to get back to, you know, the expectation of a soccer player, a men's soccer player at Michigan, and what we were looking for. And that started with Matt Fisher, Isaiah Goldson, Will Baker. All those guys are now seniors. So they're still in the group. You know, Joao Paulo Ramos, Murphy Parker, Duilio Herrera. That whole group, you know, they became a foundation of resiliency. You know, we went through their first year, and we grinded it out, and getting back to the playoffs in the Big Ten was the first step. And then after that, we Kind of wanted to build on that season, you know, and build an expectation of surpassing what we did in years past.
Chaka Daley • 09:55
But sometimes these things become cyclical. You know, it's just natural in college athletics to become cyclical. And our older players now are seniors, but some of those guys are now injured, you know, the impact players. So Matt Fisher's not available for us right now. Isaiah Goldson's not available for us right now. Nico Pendleton, a special transfer, is not available for us right now. Michael Ramirez, our leading point scorer last year, is not available for us right now. But hopefully we get two or three of those guys back within a few weeks and we can. We can hold the fort. But in that time, you know, next best up, you know, is. Is what's the requirement? And I think the youth in our group is getting a great education and lesson on what it's what it takes to be competitive at this level. And I think that's great for the future, without question, and hopefully the future of this season, the future of years to come, but certainly the future of this season.
Brian Boesch • 10:51
Yeah, I can do both. There's no question exactly along those lines. Have there been any individuals who have stepped up who, if I would have asked you this question a month, three months, six months ago, the player may not even have been in the conversation about getting playing time or significant playing time, but being pressed into duty, they've been able to showcase maybe more than you would have anticipated.
Chaka Daley • 11:14
Yes, there's a. There's a couple young guys that I think we expected to. That we were hopeful would be impactful, but you never know till they're here, but. But I think they've done a really good job. I think Andrew Craig has come in and done a great job for the group, and I think he's got a great future here and hopefully beyond. Alex Gimple has come in and done a good job, but as many freshmen, you know, many attacking freshmen, it's hard, you know, I mean, you're in the waves of games and you're at the mercy of service sometimes, so. But I think he's been. He's done a really good job for the group, and I think Landon Strohmeyer is another young player that's done a really good job for the group. Cam Estala is another good player. Again, we brought in, I think, a good foundation of. Of youth, youthful players with pretty good youth experience and MLS Next Pro experience that give them an opportunity to understand, you know, the level of competition they're going to face, but they really don't know you know, you don't know what you don't know until you're in it.
Chaka Daley • 12:16
And you realize Notre Dame versus Michigan is not like anything in any sport. You know, can come down to any sport when you have a peer institution going for it. That's nothing like any sport. Now when you have Indiana versus Michigan, you know, in Indiana is a national power. Seven national titles, the flagship program in our, in our conference, certainly that's one that is that you highlight everyone highlights in your schedule. We don't want you to as a coach, we want you to take every game and respect every game as it goes. But, you know, now that it's here, we can, we can certainly highlight that, you know, that's the next best game up or the next best final. We have to play on Friday with a group that's learning as we go. You know, you have sixteen days to prepare, you know, to try to chase sixteen weeks. And, you know, I think our group has done a really good job, you know, upon their return, and they've worked really hard to put themselves in a position to be competitive.
Chaka Daley • 13:07
Now it's about doing the job and understanding the resiliency required in playing teams like Notre Dame away Indiana at home, who have the same exact expectation within their program as we do.
Brian Boesch • 13:20
We'll get into that seven o' clock in Ann Arbor on Friday. Indiana in town. Definitely want to see as many of you out there as possible. We're with the head coach Chaka Daley here on Conqu'ring Heroes. Grayson Elmquist, already three goals for him. He led your team last year with six. How has he leveled up his game as yet another year where you've had to lean upon him?
Chaka Daley • 13:38
Yeah, Grayson came in a few years ago, had an injury and then had a little bit of an injury problem last year, so went through his injury spell. He did a great job in the off season, in the summer in preparing himself physically for the rigors of what's to come this year. And if he's, if he, if he does really well, we'll see what happens. Or maybe he's back for another season. He has that opportunity to do that. But he's prepared his body at another level and I think that's put him in a position to be highly competitive within our team and highly competitive within the league. He's off to a really good start at the beginning of the season and, you know, we, we think he's going to really be impactful within the team. And as guys come back into the team, we may, you know, potentially move him because we want to. Want to have him on as much as possible. You know, he's, he's always a factor.
Chaka Daley • 14:31
He's a physical presence. He's got good pace, he's got good power. He's very good around the goal and he's, and he's really hungry and he's really a Michigan man and you want him representing the block m as much as possible on the field as much as he can.
Brian Boesch • 14:45
You mentioned in goal Isaiah Goldson, haven't seen him yet this season. Thoughts on what Alan Bean has done so far and, and is it hope that Isaiah will be back at some point this season?
Chaka Daley • 14:55
Yeah, Allen has done a really good job, you know. You know, it's not easy when someone's played three years, almost every minute and then to get the opportunity behind them and be there for two years, you know, training every day it's another level or another step forward, taking some of these games, but. And then also directing the youth. So he's learning how to direct and he's also directing guys that are learning how to play within this level. So it's a little bit two pronged thing. So we're working real hard with Allen and Allen's working really hard. He's always been a great student of the game. He's always worked really hard. He's always prepared himself for being ready. We always talk about be ready at any moment and his moment came up in preseason and he's gotten the opportunity to grab all the minutes and he's done a really good job. We don't know, you know, where, you know, Isaiah Goldson or Patrick Los or two other goalkeepers on the roster that are highly regarded as much as Alen Bean.
Chaka Daley • 15:57
We don't know where they're, they're going to be this week, next week. So we just, you know, one game at a time and we see, we see how things go. Fortunately for us, we play one game a week right now.
RJ Arone • 16:07
Yeah.
Chaka Daley • 16:08
Which is very different and unique come October. It doesn't both that. Well, you know, it's kind of a flash of games, but right now we play one game at a time and it helps our group kind of train, prepare, understand the levels of what's going to come. And really sometimes it's better though to not linger if you can get a game out of your system. So certainly we'll train hard this week in preparation for, for what's to come for the rest of the season.
Brian Boesch • 16:35
Yeah. Indiana this Friday, out to Los Angeles to take on UCLA next Friday, the eighteenth and Then at Northwestern on the twenty fifth. So plenty of travel, but some gaps there when you do have those coach with such a young team, I'm sure not everything is geared toward the next opponent. A lot will be for Indiana and then for UCLA. But does this give you and your staff more time to focus on some things that maybe a young team wouldn't be able to if there were a game every three or four days? Because prep has to be quicker.
Chaka Daley • 17:05
Yeah. Two or three years ago, we, you know, when we brought in that new group, we made a decision not to solely focus on the opponent. You know, to really be about Michigan and be about what is important to us and what's important to us on, you know, defending, what's important to us, attacking, what's important to us, and set pieces, what's important to us with regards to mentality. And I think we coach that more than we coach, you know, what Indiana is going to do, what UCLA is going to do, or what Northern Northwestern is going to do. And we want to create, you know, core principles within the group or an identity. And we have a game model that we want to follow. We feel the game model supersedes the opponent and it's about us, you know, and that's the most important thing. So our toughness and energy is about us. Our being disciplined and organized is about us.
Chaka Daley • 17:51
Our possession to create chances is about us. You know, having positive reactions in the game is about us. We feel that that formula directly correlates to results. And if we can get, you know, good grades in those, in a level of a report card, then we think that's the process to winning games at this level.
Brian Boesch • 18:10
Lastly, want to talk about that Indiana matchup to get it at home and to get it as your Big Ten opener? That. That's a heck of a stiff test. Does it kind of act as a litmus test to show, hey, this is one of the premier programs in the league and nationally, if we approach this game well, we can approach any opponent we play well because of what Indiana's accomplished.
Chaka Daley • 18:31
Yeah, I think, you know, fortunately we get to schedule are out of conference opponents and then the league determines your your in conference. But for out of conference, we purposely put Notre Dame, you know, on the schedule early because we want to play a tough opponent. We want to play another tough physical opponent like LMU, which we did at the beginning of the season. And then to play Indiana, you obviously would like all your horses when you play them, but it's also, like you said, it's going to be a great test for our group. And I know our group will be up forward and excited for the opportunity to show themselves not only to each other, but certainly to the Big Ten and the rest of the country. And I know the guys will be excited for it. And you know, what's not to be excited about, you know, when you have, when you have a program like that coming here, they've set the standard and them, Maryland, Washington, you know, in the last fifteen years I've been here, we've had three national champs in the Big Ten.
Chaka Daley • 19:28
So, you know, obviously the league is setting a great standard, so it's easy to emulate those, but we want to emulate it in our own form and make sure that we're trying to play the, the Michigan brand of other football that we play.
Brian Boesch • 19:42
Mgoble dot com tickets to get yours. The impact of a great environment inside the, um, soccer stadium on a match like this,
Chaka Daley • 19:52
it is impossible to replicate. You know, in the end, when we are packed and we have our ultras and we have our student body and we have our community behind us, you know, last year I think we had three sellouts in the season, and I think in all of those games, we found a way to win those games. So, you know, the sellouts are incredibly important. You know, what's not to be excited about? To play in front of your family and your friends and, and your student body. And they make the, they make the extra player without question or extra too, hopefully, you know, but certainly the extra player and, you know, it's. And it's an exciting environment when, you know, the games get tough or the games get hard. You always suffer in games. You know, when, when you're playing against good teams, you have to dig in and you have to fight and you have to grind. Then I think that makes, that helps you, you know, when you, when you're doing those tough moments and then you can really enjoy the fruits of your labor.
Brian Boesch • 20:43
Chaka Daley. Appreciate the time. Good luck on Friday and beyond and we appreciate you carving out some, some time for us here on Conqu'ring Heroes.
Chaka Daley • 20:49
I appreciate it.
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Brian Boesch • 20:57
Thanks so much to Coach Daley for making the time. Thanks to Ella Demetrician, to RJ Arone and all those who helped make the introduction possible as well. It's a great time all across campus and it'll be a great rest of the week here on M GO Blue Podcast, the preview edition of in the Trenches, presented by Meijer. Coming up on Thursday afternoon, John sets you up for the Wolverines and the Longhorns, and then twelve fourteen the kick on Saturday Wolverines and Sooners on. We'll have the full recap here on in the Trenches post game edition for everybody. A part of Conqu'ring Heroes. I'm Brian Boesch. Thanks for listening and Go Blue.
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Jeff Laurence • 21:34
Thanks for listening to Conqu'ring Heroes, part of our Michigan Athletics Podcast Network, M GO Blue Podcasts. The preceding has been a Learfield presentation of the Michigan Sports Network.
