Tozer more than an indoor soccer coach; he's a winner

The winningest coach in indoor soccer history didn't achieve prodigious success by thinking about becoming the winningest coach in indoor soccer history. Keith Tozer always has preferred to focus on the smaller details, understanding the results were a product of several other important steps along the way.
Case in point No. 1: Tozer, who has spent the past 21 seasons as coach of the Milwaukee Wave, keeps a journal of every practice and every game, jotting down his thoughts on strategies and drills. The journals, some decades old, remain with him to this day.
"He has a lot of notebooks," said Wave player Giuliano Oliviero, who first joined the team under Tozer in 1995. "He can look back on his notes when we're doing well or not doing as well. If someone calls him out on something, he's got proof. On this date, this is exactly what we worked on."
Case in point No. 2: Tozer purposely keeps his players from getting comfortable, which could lead to complacency. Tozer is a master inspirer and begins planting the seeds for success as soon as the season begins. He does, after all, own a motivational company on the side.
"He'll show up the first practice of preseason and say to each player, 'What's your goal today?'" said Art Kramer, who served as Tozer's assistant coach with the Wave from 1998-2003 and 2005-2008. "You see their wheels are turning. He'll say, 'You mean you came to this practice and you don't have a goal?' So right away to start the season, guys are thinking that way to set a goal. He's constantly teaching, constantly working."
Though other coaches in various sports find ways to push players and motivate, few have attained the kind of results Tozer has on the field.
In his coaching career, Tozer has won 730 games and been selected as the Major Indoor Soccer League Coach of the Year nine times. He hasn't posted a losing season since his first year with the Wave in 1992-93. Consider that the Wave had five losing seasons in their first eight years of existence before Tozer began. Since that time, Tozer has brought six indoor titles to the Wave — three in the National Professional Soccer League (1998, 2000, 2001) and three more in the MISL (2005, 2011, 2012).
Tozer, 56, attributes some of that success to the Wave ownership. Although he has worked for five different owners, all have been supportive of Tozer and the team. He also deflects credit to the players, who are the ones that go win games.
But ultimately, it would be hard to argue everything doesn't come back to Tozer.
"I think I'm a student of the game," Tozer said. "I still feel like I have a lot to learn about the game. I think I have a lot more to learn about how to manage people and personalities. That's what keeps me thirsty and keeps me going."
Tozer has achieved more than perhaps any man in the history of indoor soccer, even beyond the wins and losses. 
His career in indoor soccer dates to the very beginning of the sport. When the MISL held its first college draft in 1978, Tozer was selected as the first player overall by the Cincinnati Kids.
He briefly played one season of outdoor soccer with the Pennsylvania Stoners in 1979 but returned the same year to the indoor game, where he has remained ever since. As a player, Tozer spent time with the Hartford Hellions, Pittsburgh Spirit, Louisville Thunder and Atlanta Attack. And he was thought of well enough to earn the rare distinction as a player/coach beginning in 1984 with the Thunder. 
In 1992, after bouncing around between Los Angeles, Atlanta and Kansas City, Tozer decided he had spent too much time away from his family, which was based in Atlanta. He was prepared to move back to Georgia and launch a career in sports marketing and television.
Then, he received a call from the owners in Milwaukee to coach.
"I said, 'If I'm going to come, it would have to be something long term,'" Tozer recalled. "I didn't have my mind on 24 years, but it definitely had to be something long term. It's just turned out to be a blessing in disguise."
Another blessing came Tozer's way in 1996, when he became coach of the United States futsal national team — a position he still holds that has changed his philosophy as Wave coach. Futsal is a variant of soccer played on a smaller field with a smaller ball and just five players on each team and a goalkeeper.
Because of the nature of the sport, an emphasis on ball control and passing in tiny spaces became paramount. Tozer implemented those same techniques with his Wave team and is considered an innovator in the game of indoor soccer.
Oliviero said when he joined the Wave, they focused more on passing the ball long to the team's forwards and hoping for a goal. But based on Tozer's experiences with futsal, watching the great players from Brazil and Spain, the coach slowly added more futsal tactics. Maintaining ball possession and striking at precisely the right moment can be demoralizing on an opponent — and the Wave have broken the spirits of their share of teams.
All of Tozer's success has made some wonder — Oliviero included — whether Tozer should have used his knowledge to push for a job on a bigger platform. Indoor soccer is more of a niche sport and receives far less attention internationally than outdoor soccer.
"If he were ever given a chance in the outdoor game, he would be great," Oliviero said.
Tozer said he once interviewed for a coaching position in Major League Soccer but has no regrets about remaining an indoor coach.
"I really don't think that much about it," he said. "Some people have tagged me as an indoor guy. To me, soccer is soccer." For the time being, Tozer sounds just fine being tagged as an indoor guy. Just last week, he agreed to a three-year contract that will keep him with the Wave through the 2015-16 season.
"I'm excited about that," Tozer said. "Hopefully three turns into another three. I know there's a lot of coaches in a lot of sports who coach well into their 70s. I've still got a lot of years left."
And, chances are, a lot of winning left, too.

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