Jake Nations stepped onto the field at the Historic Columbus Crew Stadium ready to start in the Division Two Men’s Soccer State Championship. While victory was out of reach, Nations reflected on the dedication and passion that helped bring him to this stage and was able to keep pushing.
Nations is a senior at Revere High School (RHS) involved in many activities. He is a board member of the “R” leadership club, a member of National Honor Society (NHS), a captain of the soccer team, and he even founded the RHS men’s volleyball club.
Nations came to the Revere district from Boston in the fifth grade. He involved himself with soccer to try to make new friends and found himself fitting in.
“I was trying to fit in when I got here…. Most of my friend group are still just my teammates from soccer teams I’ve played on,” Nations said.
Nations began his soccer journey as an attacker in Boston when he was four years old. He would switch to playing on the opposite side of the field as a goalkeeper just a few years later and has been perfecting his craft since then. He enrolled himself in club teams and goalie training where he would train four days a week.
“I was taller than most of the other kids then, but you probably wouldn’t believe that now…. I really liked playing goalie and that’s probably what drove me to train so much. I liked that feeling of working toward improvement and I could see myself getting better,” Nations said.
Nations is a four time Varsity letter winner on the RHS men’s soccer team. He started two of his four years during which he helped the team win four Suburban League titles, four district tournament titles, a regional tournament title, and started in the latest RHS soccer state championship appearance.
“I’ll always remember the Revere soccer journey. I love the guys from our team and we accomplished a lot during our time for sure,” Nations said.
His father, Dennis Nations, has supported him through his soccer career by encouraging him to keep pushing himself. He said he was proud of how far his son has come.
“He’s worked so hard to get to where he is now…. I’m most proud of that effort that he put in because not everyone can say that they gave their all to something. Plus, the team wins a lot and he was voted as one of the best in the area so I’m even happier that it paid off,” The elder Nations said.
Among the team, Nations was one of only three captains chosen by his peers to help lead the team during his senior season, but leadership was not something that Nations had not been tasked with before. He was also a captain on his club team growing up and a member of the “R” leadership club’s executive board.
“I’ve always been a very loud player, so I started trying to lead with my words instead of just yelling at people. The leadership club definitely helped me with that. I was there when it began and only missed a couple of meetings…. I just wanted to keep building a good culture on the team or the future,” Nations said.
His mother, Julie Nations, said that she is proud of his character and that he has been looking to help others for as long as she can remember.
“He used to help his siblings a lot with their homework or chores when they were younger…. He’s always given to or helped others and I know that he wanted to be a captain on the soccer team so I’m happy they selected him to help lead them,” she said.
Outside of soccer, Nations is also involved in a variety of clubs. In fact, he founded the men’s volleyball club at RHS earlier this year which has been growing.
“Volleyball has just always been one of my favorite sports to play or watch. It turned out that I had a lot of friends who liked to play too when they could, so I looked into making a team for the school,” he said.
It was a complicated process, however. It took Nations three years just to get the club up and running because he had to organize gym space around other programs at RHS. He also had to get an advisor for the team, and most importantly he could not make a team yet. To make a high school team, there first has to be a club for three years, so while Nations will not be able to compete for RHS, students in the future may be able to because of him.
“It was a real task to set up the volleyball club for sure. I initially just wanted to make a team because a lot of people said they would play if I did, but it ended up being more complicated than that. I’m still really proud of where it is right now and I hope it grows and maybe even becomes a team,” he said.
Along with club and athletic success, Nations has also had lots of academic success. Nations boasts a 4.6 GPA while enrolled in some of RHS’s most challenging courses. He keeps pushing himself because he has a goal for the future he wants to complete.
I want to study volcanology in the future, he said.
For years Nations has been improving his resume trying to get into the University of Washington in Washington to study his niche major. He was recently accepted into Washington and plans to stick with his original goal.
“I was so happy to get into Washington. I had been planning that for years and having it work out was special for sure. The campus is beautiful and they have the best program for what I want to do so I couldn’t be happier,” Nations said.
