John van Buskirk (born April 13, 1972) is an American

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

coach and a former player.

Playing career

Van Buskirk was a star player for his Granite City high school team, where he won two state championships, was chosen for the IHSA All-State team, was a Gatorade All-American, and served as team captain his senior year. After high school, John went to play for Indiana University. With Indiana, his team reached the #1 overall ranking in the country and played in a national championship. He went on to play 12 years of professional soccer in Germany. He made appearances in

Bundesliga The Bundesliga (; ), sometimes referred to as the Fußball-Bundesliga () or 1. Bundesliga (), is a professional association football league in Germany. At the top of the German football league system, the Bundesliga is Germany's primary footba ...

2. Bundesliga The 2. Bundesliga ( ) is the second division of professional football in Germany. It was implemented 11 years after the founding of the Fußball-Bundesliga as the new second division for professional football. The 2. Bundesliga is ranked below ...

, and German

Regionalliga The Regionalliga () is the fourth tier in the German football league system. Until 1974, it was the second tier in Germany. In 1994, it was introduced as the third tier. Upon the creation of the new nationwide 3. Liga in 2008, it became the four ...

. Buskirk was the team captain of

Sportfreunde Siegen Sportfreunde Siegen is a German association football club based in Siegen, North Rhine-Westphalia. After going through insolvency in 2008, the first team was forcibly relegated to the fifth-tier NRW-Liga. Promotion to fourth division Regionallig ...

in the 2. Bundesliga for three years. He made a total of 272 professional soccer appearances in Germany and scored 63 goals total.

Coaching career

As a coach, Van Buskirk holds a Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) international C License. His professional coaching career includes Kickers Emden (2006–07) and he was an assistant coach for

AC St. Louis AC St. Louis was an American professional soccer team based in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Founded in December 2009, the team played its first and only season the next year in the NASL Conference of the temporary USSF D2 Pro League, the se ...

until the team folded in 2010. John's college coaching career includes Men's head coach at Mckendree University (2013–2016) and an assistant coach at the University of Missouri-St. Louis ( UMSL) from 2011 to 2013. Currently, he is the Director of Coaching and Player Development a
Glen-Ed Soccer Club
in Edwardsville, IL.

References

External links

* 1972 births Living people American men's soccer players Men's association football forwards American soccer coaches KFC Uerdingen 05 players Rot Weiss Ahlen players Sportfreunde Siegen players FC Rot-Weiß Erfurt players Kickers Emden players Bundesliga players 2. Bundesliga players American people of Dutch descent American expatriate men's soccer players American expatriate soccer players in Germany Indiana Hoosiers men's soccer players {{US-footy-forward-stub