Warren Township High School has a phrase that they expect every student to follow: the Warren Way. It goes as follows: “Respectful, Resilient, Engaged, Now and Always.” Ethan Cole is an example of someone who naturally follows it. He is respectful to everyone, he is constantly engaged with his classes, keeping all A’s in his AP courses; he is also one of the most resilient people I know because of what he had to go through. Ethan Cole is a junior at Warren Township high school and also the varsity soccer goalie, and doing this story not just made me learn more about a friend, I learned how inspiring his story is.
Ethan started playing soccer at a very young age, but it wasn’t until the fourth grade where he started playing goalie. Ethan said, “When I was young I didn’t really play goalie. But then, in around fourth or fifth grade I started to play half of the game in goal and half of the game in field. And I think playing in goal I thought I was pretty good at it even though I’ve never done it before.” This natural ability and overall liking for the position made him want to pursue being a goalie, explaining that, “As I got a little older and a little older, I started staying away from the field and playing the full game in goal. I kept improving and kept getting better and better and ended up being really good which I think helped me side playing goalie instead of playing the field.” Austin Pyrek, a junior and teammate of Ethan from a young age talks about Ethan’s skill and work ethic, which has been a common theme throughout his come-up in soccer, saying, “I don’t even have to explain athletically how hard he works because you see the results on the field.” These developments in his game has shaped the goalie he is today, as it has allowed him to improve to the point where he’s playing in a tournament called the Body Armor Championship.
Ethan and the team played in the tournament (ended September 24th) where in the end, they wound up taking the slight edge and winning it all. Ethan described how the games went saying, “In our first game, we beat Matea Valley 4-1. And then in our second game, we had a back and forth game and we won 4-3. That was against Saint Ignatius. Today was the final because we won our first two games and we played against Addison trail. It was a tight game, not too many chances for each side. The game went to PK’s [penalty kicks] and I saved two of the PK’s that they took to clutch up the victory for our team.” Although Ethan is great at soccer, playing it in college isn’t necessarily on his radar just yet. When asked about college, he replied explaining, “that’s something I really haven’t thought of to be honest yet. I think I still have lots of different opportunities I can do. If I do get the opportunity to play, I would consider playing goalie in college, but I would also heavily consider playing baseball in college.” He put in a lot of time and effort for both sports, not just soccer. He was on junior varsity last year for Warren, and when asked if he would pick between the two, he said, “If you told me to pick right now, I definitely wouldn’t be able to tell you which one I would rather play in the future or that I think I’m
better at too.” He is very good at sports, but his main priority is making sure he gets an education. Ethan thinks that being a student athlete is incredibly important. He believes that, “Maintaining grades is one of if not the most important part of being a student. The thing I always like to look at is if you play sports in high school or even college, you’re labeled as a student athlete. Student always comes first.” Not only will it apply for school and college, but it even helps later on in life and is involved with the person you become. Ethan says, “Paying attention in school, getting good grades is gonna help you in your future and I believe it plays quite an important role in not only being successful but also being a good human being. If you aren’t paying attention or doing good in school, you’re not gonna be able to have the basic life to do whatever it is like support a family, have a good job, and all that stuff.” It’s also important to his coaches as Coach Ahonen, head coach of Warren’s varsity soccer team said that, “The meaning of student athlete is pretty simple in my book. Student comes first and those athletes that have had the most success for our program have been top notch students and then continue their success on the field.
Yes Ethan is a great athlete, he’s very good at both soccer and baseball; he’s also a fantastic student as he takes a lot of harder classes and still keeps up with them consistently. But, all of this wasn’t the reason why he’s featured in the article. December 1st, 2022 is a day that will be engraved in Ethan’s brain forever because of the injury he sustained. In his own words, this is what happened was, “Sophomore year I had weight lifting as my gym class. The injury happened while I was dead lifting so I obviously did quite a few warm-ups and wasn’t feeling any type of pain so I decided to try and max out. I did the first rep fine, maybe with a bit of struggle. But then my second rep, as I started to get towards the top, I started to lean back in order to try and get it all the way up and lock out when I should have been squeezing to get it all the way to the top. And then when I started to lean back, I felt a pop in my back.” This pop wound up being a nerve injury in his back. He needed surgery and his road to recovery was long and treacherous. Constantly going to physical therapy and working to get better at home was something that happened to Ethan commonly. He explained, “I would go there [physical therapy] twice a week for forty-five minutes but I would also be given a bunch of at home stuff to do to make sure I was keeping up with my recovery.” He finally stopped going back there in July, going there consistently for more than 6 months just to be able to kind of walk. This was devastating for Ethan as he lives, breathes, and sleeps sports. He had to go to physical therapy, and do things on his own just to be able to somewhat walk. He missed a lot of school and was struggling with all normal things that people take for granted. It wasn’t just doing mundane things either, Ethan said, “Not only the physical aspect is extremely hard obviously but the mental side of things was also what was hardest for me. Not being able to be who I am as a good athlete and stuff like that, it was really hard for me to work through it and get to where I am, even just today, even though I think that I and feel that I could be better.”
After a lot of time trying to back, Ethan’s resiliency paid off, as now he is back to playing at 90%. Coach Ahonen has been able to see Ethan grow and develop through it everything and said, “Ethan has always been a hard-working kid even as a student at Woodland Intermediate [where he works]. Ethan has had a rough year due to his injury. Coming off of last year where he was the varsity starting keeper and then to have a major injury has not been easy for him, but he knows he is getting stronger and better each week and we are excited to see his improvement.” Coach Ahonen also described Ethan in three words, with those being “Hardworking, Team Player, and Coachable.” Ethan has battled through a lot over the past year and something he would tell other people going through somewhat of the same thing is to “Never back down never what?” which was made popular through a youtuber and later spread through tiktok. The trend is where someone says “never back down never what?” that the other person on the receiving end says never give up. In all seriousness, Ethan would advise someone going through something similar that, “the biggest part is having the confidence in yourself that it might take a really long time but eventually it will always get back to normal. It will take a lot of work and you’ll have to push yourself harder than you ever thought you would have to.”
Ethan not only exemplifies what it means to be a perfect student, he also balances all this with extracurriculars. He embodies the Warren Way in a deeper way than other students can say they do, which is why I think Ethan Cole is the perfect candidate to write an article about someone in the Warren community who has made a great impact and being an inspiration to all.
