The final game of the 2017 season was a do-or-die situation for the men’s soccer team.

The Yellow Jackets needed a win or a draw on the road against rival Washington & Jefferson to qualify for the Presidents’ Athletic Conference tournament for the first time since 2014. Waynesburg couldn’t get the desired result, and a 3-1 loss to the Presidents ended its playoff hopes.

For head coach Brad Heethuis and most of the roster, the disappointment serves as motivation for next season. For defender Bryan Sontag, the team’s only senior, it was the end of the line. Heethuis, who describes Sontag as a “silent assassin,” experienced the highs-and-lows of Waynesburg men’s soccer over the past four years, both for the team and for Sontag individually.

“I think it’s pretty cool to have gone through it with Bryan, and [it] speaks to his resilience,” Heethuis said. “I think he’s been through a lot in the last four years, both personally and as a team…Being able to try to come up and lead the team in an upward trend speaks volumes to him as a person and as a leader. Brian’s a quiet guy, but he’s a lead by example guy.”

In Sontag’s freshman season, the Jackets qualified for the conference tournament. Over the next two years, however, Waynesburg won a combined total of five games.

Having experienced success at Canon-McMillan high school—where he won a WPIAL Championship in 2012— not having similar results at Waynesburg was irritating for Sontag at times.

“It was definitely frustrating,” Sontag said. “The group of guys that we had my freshman year was just a really special group of guys that [had a] different kind of mindset, and they knew what they wanted to do…after that, it really was a rebuilding process.”

Despite Waynesburg’s struggles, the Jackets showed steady improvement the past two years, going from winning just one game in 2015 to nearly getting back to the postseason this past season. For Sontag, that progress made it easier to handle never reliving that high of getting to the playoffs.

“I feel like I’d have more of a negative outlook on [missing the postseason] if we weren’t showing improvement,” Sontag said. “But we showed improvement all three years, and we’re going to just keep getting better.”

College soccer took a physical toll on Sontag. Over the years, he suffered multiple injuries—particularly to his ankles—but according to Heethuis, one of the things that made Sontag an example for others to follow was that his commitment to the team never waned regardless of how he was feeling or how the team was performing.

“His play was not affected whether we were winning or we were losing,” Heethuis said. “His play on the field, play in practice—he gives 100 percent…He always really encouraged the guys and we asked him to step up, because he was the only one who had been there who had tasted that success.

As a two-year captain, Sontag never saw himself as a vocal leader—that role belonged to junior goalkeeper James Snyder. But after his freshman year, he saw himself grow socially.Sontag feels that becoming more outgoing as his career went on opened the door for the bonds that he would end up creating with his teammates.

Sontag, who is graduating with a degree in athletic training, plans on going to graduate school to further his education in the field. Above all else, the bonds that Sontag made with his teammates that were a result of him coming out of his social shell are what he will miss the most.

“I think I’m going to miss the relationships the most. Just because I made a lot of relationships with all the different guys,” Sontag said. “So really just the relationships with them, relationships with my fellow students, fellow AT’s other athletes that I’ve gotten to know, I’m really going to miss the sense of community that I have.”