There have been many students who have gone through the Coppell High School soccer program with a sibling following their footsteps, but that path usually ends once the oldest has graduated.

Senior Jeremy Lind, however, plans to follow his older brother Josh Lind’s footsteps all the way to Nashville, Tenn.

“At the beginning, I never thought I’d end up where my brother went especially since it was a sports decision,” Jeremy said.

Josh Lind, CHS graduate of 2008, made All-District first team and Academic All-State his senior year and was captain for the Cowboys. Although Coppell lost in the bi-district playoffs to Keller, Josh was a great defender and was one of three players to receive a soccer scholarship.

“Josh was a dominant player when he was at Coppell and he has had a tremendous college career too,” boys soccer coach Shane Bybee said.

After Josh left for Lipscomb University, he left big shoes at CHS for his younger brother, Jeremy Lind, to fill.

Jeremy, who plays halfback, is an aggressive player and not just because of his height and weight. Jeremy is one of the leading scorers for the team this year scoring four goals.

After seeing his brother start his freshman year for the Bisons, Jeremy started to think about his college plans. Last summer, he officially decided to play collegiate soccer and started looking at schools.

The three main colleges he looked at were East Tennessee State University, Central Arkansas University and Lipscomb University.  After visiting all three, Jeremy decided Lipscomb University was the best fit for him overall and not just because he knew someone there.

“Once I saw all three schools, the visit to Lipscomb was the deciding factor,” Jeremy said. “The campus was nice, the team and coaches were real cool and it seemed like the best fit for me out of the three.”

With the two-year age difference, Josh and Jeremy never got the opportunity to play on the same soccer team through both club and high school. Now that Jeremy is officially going to Lipscomb, both brothers are excited to finally get the chance.

“It’s very exciting for us to have Jeremy and Josh playing together for the first time after all the years they have played soccer,” Kathi Lind said. “It will be a great opportunity for them to learn and grow together.”

Although Jeremy plays halfback at CHS, he plans on switching to defender next year to be alongside his brother on the field.

“It’s great that Jeremy will end up with his brother,” Bybee said. “Josh will be able to tell Jeremy what’s expected and give him directions too.”

 During the first half, Coppell was aggressive and kept the ball most of the time. While had a few chances to score, the ball mainly went passed the goal. Eight minutes into the game, senior captain Jordan Elgin stepped on number 10 Trojan and sprained his ankle. The injury, however, did not stop Elgin from playing the game.

“Trinity is not known to have a good soccer team but they were competitive and a good team to start the season with,” senior Colton Reese said.

While not an exciting first half, things got real interesting after half time. Early in the first half, about 5th minute into the second half junior Jake Garnett kicked the ball over the goalie’s head giving Coppell the first lead of the game. After a short celebration, Trinity got the ball and started moving fast into Cowboy territory. As number 12 player started to head to the goal, senior defensive player Brandon Donahue went to get the ball out of the box and accidently hit the player in the face. While no penalty was called, the Trinity team got real angry and started to show it on the field. After he was escorted off the field, Coppell got the ball and Trinity started to play real aggressive.

While the game was going on, number 12 came back in and went straight for Donahue and tried to start a fight with him. As teammates senior Kyler Hermanski and senior Joey McKillop came to break it up the fight, number 1 ran and hit McKillop hard in the chest and all players started yelling and running to the chaos. After the referees broke up the main fight, they gave red cards to McKillop number 1 and 12. While players 1 and 12 make sense since they were throwing the punches and starting the fight, McKillop was wrongly accused when all he tried to do was break it up.

After things started to settle down, the game started again with 24 minutes left. Many players played a little more cautiously after seeing the referees give out red cards but Coppell stayed aggressive and kept the ball in Trojan territory for most of the 24 minutes. Coppell had about three close goals before their second goal. Reese took the corner kick and made a quick pass to junior Will Simonds who crossed the ball to senior Jeremy Lind who headed it into the goal with 10 minutes left. Guaranteeing the win with that goal, the game quickly finished up giving Coppell their first real win of the season.

“It was definitely an interesting game to start the season but hopefully this win will lead to others,” Elgin said.

Coppell has a tournament in Garland this weekend. They are scheduled to play Mesquite Poteet, Austin Akins, and North Garland on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Depending on the record of those games, the team might play in the semifinals and finals on Saturday.

McKillop’s suspension could either be one to three games depending on the referee and Elgin possibly might not play this weekend’s tournament in order to fully recover for the rest of the season.