International Students Bolster Tiger Men’s Soccer Roster
An eventful year for Wittenberg Men’s Soccer continues at 4 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 1, at Edwards-Maurer Field with a celebration of six student-athletes and two student coaches during Senior Recognition Day festivities. The Tigers bring a solid overall record of 7-4-6 into the 2025 regular season finale against the College of Wooster.
While that record represents improvement from the 2024 season, the team’s on-field performance is a small part of the program’s global 2025 story. In May, more than 20 players participated in a training trip to Spain, and in August, Head Coach Dwight Burgess and his staff welcomed a recruiting class of more than 20 new student-athletes to campus, including a large cohort of international students and students hailing from states across the United States who have enriched the program and contributed to its success.
Amongst more than 60 players on the roster this year, nine U.S. states and seven other countries represented, making men’s soccer the Wittenberg team with the greatest international influence on campus. Those international players hail from four different continents: Cole Schachnovsky (Bangkok, Thailand), Matteo de Gama and Declan Quinn Naidoo (Pretoria, South Africa), Joseph Yost (Ramstein, Germany), Brendon Raggiunti (Brampton, Ontario, Canada), Maximilian Binder (Vienna, Austria), and Aayan Peerzada (Pune, India).
“Witt had the major I wanted, and the career opportunities for graduates are made easier when studying at Witt,” Naidoo said. “After talking with Coach Dwight and learning about the soccer program, it made me feel welcomed and it was a team that I wanted to be part of. My favorite thing about Witt is how everyone is welcoming, and this makes me feel part of a community and family.”
De Gama said his first impressions of the University and its community have been similar.
“Wittenberg has a strong business faculty, and business is what I am most interested in majoring in, specifically finance and economics,” de Gama said. “Also, out of all the soccer coaches I had spoken to when deciding what university to commit to, I felt like I had the best connection with Coach Dwight.
“I love how friendly everyone is. No one is afraid to offer help, make friends with you, and building comradery in groups (like soccer teams) and building friendships is very easy. This really helped me with moving away from home and settling in.”
Yost, an American citizen who grew up in a military family in Ramstein, Germany, also has good things to say midway through his first collegiate semester. He describes the people at Wittenberg as “amazing.”
The expanded roll call of Tiger student-athletes in the program has also allowed for increased competitive opportunities. While Wittenberg Men’s Soccer has sponsored junior varsity competition in past years, the 2025 season ushered in a new era for the program in the form of a new “developmental roster” competing in more than 10 exhibition matches.
While this weekend marks the conclusion of an eventful year, it could be seen as just the beginning for this program on the rise.