Women’s soccer coach Williams on Kansas City: ‘You become part of the family over here’

In the aftermath of Kansas City NWSL’s homecoming ceremony at Union Station in early March, Huw Williams took a moment to escape the chaos.

He’d been back in KC for less than 24 hours, but he took his wife, Stephanie, for a drive through downtown and found a vantage spot that overlooked the city.

Union Station was lit from top to bottom bright teal. Just behind that, and similarly illuminated, the Kauffman Center. And there were the One and Two Light apartment complexes and Power & Light Building, each bathed in a vibrant teal.

“Wow,” Williams thought to himself. “I’m part of this deal, you know?”

Williams, 60, is a Welshman by birth. When you first meet him, if you haven’t already noticed his accent, it won’t be long before he tells you about his heritage. He’s incredibly proud of it.

He was born in the small coastal town of Porthmadog in west Wales under the shadow of the beautiful Snowdonia National Park.

But having lived in KC since 1985, he’s also a Kansas Citian at heart.

“I’m very proud to be Welsh, very proud of my Welsh heritage,” Williams said. “But I’m a Kansas Citian. This is home.”

“Home” Wednesday night is Legends Field in Kansas City, Kan., where Williams will lead KC’s new National Women’s Soccer League team into its NWSL season opener vs. the Chicago Red Stars.

City pride runs deep inside the locker room, where the club’s official hashtag is #WePlayForKC. Williams is constantly praising the support of fans in Kansas City.

“Anyone who comes to Kansas City, it doesn’t take them long to realize that you become part of the family over here,” he said.

When he arrived in Kansas City in 1985, Williams’ first coaching job came with a youth team run out of Johnny’s BBQ. He still remembers the name of the dad who invited him into the club, Johnny White, and his son, Eric.

“I could not believe how welcoming there were of me to come into their community and help coach their kids,” Williams said.

Since then, Williams has become part of the KC soccer fabric. He won more than 20 state championships and became the executive director of KC Athletics, one of Kansas City’s largest soccer clubs.

He was also the assistant manager and general manager of the now-defunct FC Kansas City team, KC NWSL’s predecessor in its current league. He saw the club rise to the top of U.S. women’s soccer (FCKC won back to back championships in 2014-15) and fall just as quickly.

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Williams was at the forefront of bringing together top local youth clubs and creating a plan to help them stay afloat. He’s seen the Kansas City soccer landscape grow in the past 35 years. He’s been an integral part of helping it grow.

He said KC reminds him of Wales.

“Being from Wales, I don’t know if I would be able to be in a humongous city,” Williams said. “Kansas City is a big city, but it does have that small-town feel, and that’s my background.”

Williams lives in the Roeland Park area. When he leaves home, he often bumps into people he knows or sees them out exercising. And they’re usually friendly.

“The people in Kansas City, I think we that we undervalue ourselves,” he said.

It’s a mindset that touches close to home. He says the people of Wales endure a similar feeling — a feeling of modesty and inferiority to other countries and areas, yet at the same time a lot of pride.

That notion that KC is a worthy, valuable and vibrant place is something he reminds those around him — including the soccer players he coaches.

“I had to do a little bit to prepare our youth teams to be confident,” he said. “To be confident enough to say, ‘You don’t have to be from L.A., New York, Chicago to be a good soccer player. You don’t have to be from one of those cities to be a good team.’”

Before embarking on road trips, he’d take his youth players to The Plaza. They’d go for a walk, and he’d remind them that this is the city they’re representing: Be proud of it.

That hasn’t changed at the professional level. Many of his current players grew up elsewhere and hadn’t set foot in KC. With their newfound pride comes pressure to succeed.

Williams is a fierce competitor and his own toughest critic.

“I definitely feel like we need to succeed — for sure, we feel that,” he said.

In the recent Challenge Cup, a tournament that preceded the NWSL season, KC picked up just one of an available 12 points. Williams considered the Challenge Cup a preseason tournament, but he knows that point tally wasn’t good enough.

So he’ll stay up until 3 a.m. after games to break down film in order to present it to his team the next day. He’ll be the first one to the training grounds and last to leave. His assistant coaches are assigned to scout other teams, but he assists in creating every scouting report.

“I will put more pressure on myself than anybody else could ever put,” he said. “So yes, I do feel the pressure to do well.”

Following Kansas City’s first game at Children’s Mercy Park, a 3-1 loss to the Houston Dash, he said the hardest part was not being able to interact with the team’s fans. League restrictions forbade it for fear of spreading COVID.

All he could do was wave at them.

“I’ve got so many people yelling at me and I’m feeling like a jerk,” he said.

Unable to shake their hands, he made a note of all the people he recognized in the stands and emailed them later that night, apologizing for not being able to greet and thank them in person.

He entered Wednesday’s league home opener hoping to deliver them, and the city he’s come to call home, their first victory.

“It feels that the team is part of the community already. It’s part of Kansas City,” Williams said. “When we actually get that first win, it will be we get that first win. It will be every single one of us here.”

This story was originally published May 26, 2021 at 10:36 AM with the headline "Women’s soccer coach Williams on Kansas City: ‘You become part of the family over here’."