One of the fastest growing and exciting regional leagues is the Gulf Coast Premier League. Originally founded at the Louisiana Premier League in 2014, the name was officially changed in 2016 to the GCPL. The league has expanded far beyond the boundaries of Louisiana to now include clubs from Louisiana, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, and Texas. This Spotlight focuses on the only Texas member of the league, Central Texas Lobos.
So what’s the history of your club?
We began in 1996 in local amateur adult and youth leagues in the Austin area. The club grew out of my work with immigration legal services, and especially with unaccompanied minors in Central Texas. Soccer was a great way to bring these youth from different countries together, many of whom had no immediate family in the area, and integrate them into the community through the game we all love. We have always had a focus on diversity and inclusion as a club. We branded as the Central Texas Lobos in 2016 when we made the jump to the Texas Premier Soccer League.
Pretty intense logo you got there. Why lobos?
As we rebranded, in 2016 we partnered with a local brewery who wanted to spotlight their “Lobo” line of beer. We liked the idea of the lobo/wolf mascot, that promotes a concept of the pack; every individual working together to make the whole greater than the sum of its parts. We came up with five naming options that related to the Lobo branding, and “Central Texas Lobos” was selected through a fan vote as the prefered club name. Wile the brewery has since been sold and we no longer maintain that partnership, we will be “Lobos” from here on – it is our identity.
Noticed you have a Lobos bandana available in your shop. First we’ve ever seen. What’s your clubs approach to merchandise?
The bandana is versatile; we have a scarf which has been very popular, but with GCPL we play summer in Texas. So we wanted something appropriate to the games and the heat of Texas in June and July. Our merchandising is mostly designed as things that are fun and inexpensive so that our fans can enjoy them to enhance the gameday atmosphere. It’s just stuff we like and hope our fans will too! As we grow in GCPL as a club, we will probably evolve a more strategic merchandising approach. But for now, it’s just stuff that our players or fans have said they would like to have.
You play in the GCPL, who has made some news with expansion lately. Can you talk about the league? Strengths and weaknesses?
The GCPL encompasses elite teams from the gulf coast states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, and now Texas. The league now has an affiliated league – the Great Plains Premier League – which will begin a full competitive season in 2020. This is emblematic of the GCPL philosophy and approach that USSF 4th division leagues should be regional. The second underlying core belief of the GCPL is “club over league” meaning that the individual clubs make the league and therefore the league supports them. It’s opposite of many others where the league operates above the clubs and dictates down to them. The league is very collaborative; all of the clubs involved support each other because the success of one elevates the rest. Competition is on the field, not off. And the third element to the league is minimum standards for quality of teams including facilities, performance, and stability. With a rare and temporary exceptions, GCPL stadiums/arenas must have controllable ingress, fields larger than 110 X 65 yards (and most are larger) with a FIFA approved surface, and minimum capacity seating. Clubs must maintain web and social media accounts. And a trainer or other medical staff must be available at all matches. There are also requirements for amenities for traveling teams, such as dressing rooms. All of these requirements elevate the level of the game for both the players and the fans: you know what to expect when you play a Gulf Coast team!
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