Coming into Binghamton with a strong vision and a knack for recruiting, Neel Bhattacharjee, who took the helm of the Binghamton women’s soccer program last month after the reassignment of Sarah McClellan, is already working hard to make the most of his first shot as a collegiate head coach.
“Neel is a highly respected coach and leader on a national level and has accumulated significant quality experience with championship programs and elite student-athletes,” BU Director of Athletics Pat Elliot said in Bhattacharjee’s introductory press conference. “We are excited to have Neel join our athletics family and lead our women’s soccer program into the future.”
Planning to use his relationships with club teams across the region to turn Binghamton into a destination for elite talent in the Northeast, Bhattacharjee got his first taste of coaching in the Southwest. A member of Arizona State’s men’s club soccer team while working toward a Ph.D. in geography, Bhattacharjee first found his passion for coaching in the Grand Canyon state while working with club soccer programs in the area.
“Eventually one opportunity led to another,” Bhattacharjee said. “So I started working with a high-profile club out there, the Olympic Development Program, on the state level and then on the regional level — and it eventually led to me working on the [Under-21] U.S. National Team. Shortly after that I knew that was what I wanted to do as a career and that’s when I decided to get into Division I athletics.”
Serving as an associate head coach at George Washington University from 2006-08, Bhattacharjee helped to oversee a GW team that improved its record in the Atlantic 10 conference each year. Moving to serve as a recruiting coordinator and goalkeeper coach for Atlantic Coast Conference member Boston College in the 2009 season, Bhattacharjee shined in his role with the Eagles in arguably the most competitive collegiate soccer conference in the nation. During his three seasons at BC, Bhattacharjee’s teams reached the national playoffs each year — bringing the Eagles as far as the semifinal round in 2010.
Making his move to Central New York in 2011, Bhattacharjee spent four years on ACC-member Syracuse’s staff, with a career highlight of bringing in a top-20 recruiting class in 2014. Bhattacharjee also assisted the Orange with on-field training, opponent scouting, scheduling, budgeting and compliance. Now in charge for the Bearcats, Bhattacharjee is impressed with all that BU has to offer academically, athletically and administratively.
“From top to bottom I felt there was a lot to offer here,” Bhattacharjee said of his newest home campus. “So I’m excited because there are tremendous upsides — it’s somewhere I can recruit to and ultimately I think it’s a school where we can be competing for an America East championship in the not-too-distant future.”
Leading a team featuring veterans who were in contention for America East (AE) women’s soccer titles in the not-too-distant past, Bhattacharjee looks forward to establishing a relationship with his returning players during the spring season. He will also work to establish a new culture for the Bearcats on and off of the field.
“I do want to become more familiar with each player in terms of what they do, physically, tactically, technically, mentally,” he said. “It’s important for me to have a good relationship with each player as far as what’s going to be effective from a coaching standpoint.”
While many of Bhattacharjee’s tactical changes to the team are set to come later this spring, he says that fans can expect a disciplined, compact defense to complement a possession-style and attack-minded offense this fall — welcome changes after the Bearcats were shutout nine times in 2015. For now, however, Bhattacharjee is embracing his newest role one day at a time.
“It’s really time to get things organized,” he said, “and get together a plan in terms of what the different days of the spring will look like.”