Palm Beach North Sports - September 2023

10 P A L M B E A C H N O R T H SPORTS | S e p t e m b e r 2 0 2 3 Meet Perry Van der Beck SPORTS SPOTLIGHT By Dan Hauser | Photos courtesy of Perry Van der Beck and Keiser Athletics When it comes to the world of professional soccer, Perry Van der Beck has done and seen it all. He’s been a player, a manager, a technical director, and even a VP and director of player development. While his list of accolades could fill up multiple pages, his journey to the top might not be what you expect. Perry grew up in Florissant, Missouri, one of the many suburbs of St. Louis. He grew up playing baseball and soccer, his house being mere feet away from not just one but multiple soccer fields. “I lived 30 feet from my grade school,” Perry explained. “There was a playground, two soccer fields on one side, and another soccer field on the other side.” Perry’s introduction to organized soccer came thanks in large part to a gentleman by the name of Monsignor Meyer who created the Catholic Youth Council or CYC. Not only did Van der Beck immediately take to the sport, but he also learned that he was not the only soccer player in the family. “Unbeknownst to me at the time, I found out my mom played soccer in 1950 for the first women’s soccer league in the United States.” Van der Beck said. “She didn’t talk a lot about it but I’ve seen pictures in the National Soccer Hall of Fame.” By the time Perry reached middle school, he was playing soccer year-round. By that time he had decided that baseball just wasn’t for him anymore and turned his focus exclusively to soccer. At the same time that he made the decision to focus on soccer, the CYC was starting club soccer and his coaches were two players from the St. Louis Stars of the North American Soccer League (NASL). “From as early as I can remember, I was a student of the game,” Perry explained. “So if I wasn’t playing soccer I was watching it. Now all of a sudden I’m being coached by these professional players. We would train two to three times a week, and on the weekends I would go watch them play if I didn’t have a game myself.” As his foray into the game continued, so did the accolades, even from an early age. During high school, Perry was selected to play for the U17 United States National Team. Not only did his time playing for the youth National Team lead to trips around the world including Germany and France, but it also put him in front of coaches and scouts from the NASL. “I got scouted by the Tampa Bay Rowdies, the New York Cosmos, and a couple of other teams,” Perry said. “The St. Louis Stars, which was my hometown team, came to me and said ‘We’re going to draft you with the 2nd pick’. So here I think I’m getting drafted by St. Louis and next thing I know I’m