June 14, 2010
REALISTIC GOALS
D’Ambra starts rebuilding the Hawks
By Charles Cuttone
Executive Editor

Don D’Ambra, the new men’s soccer coach at St. Joseph’s University, has some realistic goals in taking over a team that went winless in 2009.

“If we can compete for the Atlantic 10, we’re successful,” said D’Ambra, who is an alumnus of the school. Getting to the A-10 playoffs seems like a long haul, especially after the team went 0-17 last year and 0-9 in the conference, but D’Ambra is ready for the rebuilding process, which is likely to take a few years, since he has not even recruited his first class yet.

“To be competitive in the Atlantic 10 is going to be a challenge,” said D’Ambra, who faces recruiting challenges from the many other schools in the Philadelphia area.

“We’ll know in the next couple of years how tough recruiting is,” he said.

After 14 years with the Philadelphia KiXX, the last eight as player-coach, D’Ambra left the indoor soccer team to take over the Hawks program from his former coach, Tom Turner. Turner retired at the end of January after 27 seasons at St. Joe’s, 23 of them as head coach. D’Ambra was the Atlantic 10 Player of the year under Turner in 1993. He holds the SJU career records for goals (41) and points (102), as well as the marks for goals (15) and points (38) in a season (1993).

D’Ambra needs to re-load the Hawks, a team coming off the worst season in program history. Because he did not accept his new position until after the MISL season, he was not as involved in recruiting this year as he would have hoped to be.

“I have reached out to players,” he said. The Hawks will have six new players coming in for next season. The class is expeted to be announced in the next week or so. “There are going to be some role players,” he said.

“That was the bad thing about starting so late,” he admitted. “It’s going to take some work and some time,” he said of turning the program around.


D'Ambra helped the KiXX to two MISL championships, as a player in 2002 and as the player/coach in 2007. He was a four-time All-Star and is the team’s all-time leading scorer, amassing 388 goals and 905 points. In eight seasons as head coach, he totaled 119 wins, which is the most in the team's history.

Since leaving the KiXX, D’Ambra has been busy not only rebuilding the Hawks, but with continuing to develop the South Jersey Elite Barons program.

D’Ambra started the South Jersey Elite program youth academy and earlier this year announced a merger with the South Jersey Barons, which will be completed by the fall. D’Ambra said the merger took ”six months and a lot of meetings comparing philosophies,” but the resulting amalgamation means “we would have more competitive teams.”