Northwestern University Athletics
Olympic Sport Feature: Men's Soccer's Mark Blades
10/16/2008 12:00:00 AM | Football
Oct. 16, 2008
Mark Blades is the type of player you notice on the soccer field. Standing just 5-foot-6, it's not his stature that makes him stand out. Despite any size limitations, Blades can regularly been seen mixing it up with individuals larger than him and throwing his body around to chase down a loose ball or cut off an opponent attempting to charge the Wildcats' net. It's this fearless, sometimes reckless, attitude in spite of his girth that has caused some Northwestern men's soccer observers to label him with the nickname "Mighty Mouse."
It is that work ethic, along with a substantial amount of talent, which helped Blades earn second-team All-Big Ten honors as a sophomore defender a year ago as the Wildcats' continually developing program finished 12-5-3 overall. At one point in the 2007 season, Northwestern earned its highest national ranking ever at No. 3.
However, it's a disappointing end to the last season's campaign that continues to drive Blades and his teammates. NU earned the No. 9 national seed for the 2007 NCAA Tournament and a first-round bye. The Wildcats hosted crosstown foe UIC in a second round contest, but the visitors stunned Northwestern 2-0 and abruptly ended the squad's season.
"That game is still in the back of my mind," said Blades. "It still drives me. You can have a great season and then it can end that quickly. You always want to learn from the past. I want to take what I learned from last year so that we can make this season all that much better."
The Lakewood, Ohio, native comes from an athletically gifted family. Mark's father, Edward, ran track at Harvard and his mother, played basketball at Case Western Reserve in Cleveland. The athletic ability trickled down to their offspring; in addition Mark playing at Northwestern, his older brother Gavin played soccer at Yale and his younger sister Jackie recently joined the Wildcat women's soccer program as a freshman. A younger brother, Luke, is involved in soccer and baseball.
As the big brother who is also playing Division I soccer in the Big Ten at a school a long way from home, Mark has been there as a sounding board for Jackie in her adjustment to life as a collegiate student-athlete.
"She likes having someone else here that she knows coming in (to college)," Mark said. "Going away is scary, so I think that she likes having me here. Her first week was kind of tough just adjusting to being away and playing a Division I sport. The women's team got here a week earlier than we did, so when I got here I just talked to her and I think it helped coming from someone who has been through it and being someone who is close to her."
It is Mark's experience with Gavin, though, that has helped him gain a new perspective, not just on the soccer field but also in life. On Dec. 20, 2005, the family was on a vacation in Utah with some friends when Gavin suffered a serious snowboarding accident in which he collided head-on with a tree. He was immediately flown to Salt Lake City where he was placed in a medically induced coma for 10 days and was forced to undergo numerous major surgeries. It proved to be a difficult period for Mark who was a senior in high school at the time.
"It was tough for a while. We were very close growing up," Mark said. "It happened right after the first semester of his freshman year at Yale. We had spent every day together for three years, going to high school and playing soccer together. Then he goes away and the first time I see him, we're on vacation and the accident happens. It was kind of a shock. I had never even really talked to him about his whole semester away before it happened. For a while I felt disconnected from him. I realize now that it affected me more than I thought it did."
Gavin was eventually work his way back into good health and in fact even attempted to make a comeback to play soccer at Yale once again. On Sept. 7 of last year, Northwestern made a trip to Yale where everyone was hoping that the two brothers and one-time teammates would be able to square off on the soccer pitch. However, doctors would not give Gavin medical clearance to return action, thus ending his collegiate soccer career. He did, though, stay on as a student assistant coach and was on the sidelines when Mark and the Wildcats posted a 3-1 win over the Bulldogs. Despite the disappointment of not being able to play against his brother, it was still a joyous day.
"I knew he was ok with it, because soccer was just kind of something he did," Mark said. "It's not as important to him as it is to me. But I would have like to have liked to have played against him. My parents are happy because it would have been a very intense matchup. It was just nice to have him there and see him in his environment at Yale and see that he's doing well. It was good for me to see him being ok and doing what he does every day."
Now in his junior year and a third-team preseason All-American, Mark continues to strive to work toward a potential professional playing opportunity either in the United States or abroad once his time at NU is through. Long term, the psychology major is eyeing a career as a sports psychologist. In the meantime, he'll continue to put himself on the line to help the Wildcats establish themselves as a national power and capture the program's first Big Ten title in school history.
