Connections - From Herkimer to Major League Soccer

Kevin Mellon ’01 is exactly where he’s always wanted to be—on a soccer field.

Two years ago, Mellon was tapped for the job of soccer operations manager for the New England Revolution, a Major League Soccer (MLS) team. Mellon is responsible for planning and executing all aspects of team travel logistics and player/family relocation. It is a demanding job organizing everything from hotels, flights, ground transportation, but the rewards are well worth it. Mellon has the satisfaction of impacting the team’s success. “I work closely with the players every single day. When the team succeeds, I know I’m doing my job.”  Since Herkimer he has had a long career in the sport of soccer from Division III to NJCAA to Prep School to Division I to FIFA to MLS. “This career path has brought me all over the world – Japan, Italy, United Arab Emirates, Switzerland, Norway, Chili, Portugal, Spain, Hungary, etc. That part is absolutely fun. But it is still a lot of work.”

Mellon has come a long way from the Cornwall Central High School student who didn’t know what he wanted to do. A family friend played soccer on the first national championship team at Herkimer, so Mellon’s father wanted him to consider Herkimer too. Mellon said, “I believed I was too good to play soccer at a community college. But my grades weren’t going to get me accepted at other schools.” His father encouraged him to visit. He drove up with his mother on a cold October day. “At first sight, I wasn’t impressed. It was Pepe’s first season as head coach, and he didn’t know who I was so he had one of the goalkeepers give us a tour. As the tour went, I thought this is really cool. After the tour I was able to see the team play Morrisville, and loved the way they played.” When getting in the car to go home, he looked at his mom and said ‘this is where I want to go.’ Mellon applied only to Herkimer.  

Mellon remembers his time at Herkimer as one of the greatest times of his life. “My entire experience from start to finish…growing as a person, finding my identity... all the professors were awesome. I found it amazing that I could get the college experience at a community college. Herkimer did that. Herkimer gave everyone the full college experience. A lot of my teammates went to Herkimer for the same reason I did.”

Mellon credits Coach Aragon with not only being a great coach, but also a positive influence in his life. “Pep made us better every day. He showed us how to succeed. He demanded the best out of us every day. We [the team] pushed each other every day and it showed with our two national championships (Pepe’s first two).”

Mellon added, “Coaching at the college level is about managing your players. You recruit good players, but you have to be able to get them to play together for you. That’s a hard thing to do. Especially at a two-year institution. In college, you have a lot of big fish from small ponds. Pep knew how to do get us to play together and at the same time represent Herkimer with class.”

Mellon says he keeps in touch with Pepe, and tries to get to as many Herkimer soccer games as he can. “Pep was a mentor for me. Over time, as adults we became friends. His door was always open. Still to this day, he impresses me. Twenty-four seasons at a junior college –that’s impressive. He loves what he does – coaching and teaching. He has this drive to be better every day.”

Recently, Mellon took time out to show some fellow Herkimer alumni around when they attended a Revolution match at Gillette Stadium. “We [Herkimer men’s soccer alumni] call each other family. Pepe and his family are part of my family. And I am a part of their family. After many alumni games and meeting many alumni through the years, before and after me, I have seen this to be true with all alumni. We are one big family. So when Pep told me the Snells were coming, of course I’m going to take the opportunity to talk to them.”

After winning two NJCAA national soccer championships at Herkimer in 1999 and 2000, Mellon continued his education at SUNY Potsdam where he continued to play soccer. After graduating in 2004 with a B.A. in history, he served as assistant coach for one year at Potsdam, then as athletic facilities manager and women’s soccer coach at North Country Community College for four years, and then two years at Bridgton Academy, an all-boys postgraduate prep school in Maine, where he was head coach, dorm parent and game day operations manager.

Then in 2010 a call came from St. John’s University. “Here was my opportunity to be an assistant coach at the Division I school,” said Mellon. After a year with St. John’s, he received an offer from UCONN. It was another opportunity he could not refuse. “That was a shock. It was a no-brainer,” Mellon said of the offer from UCONN. He spent five seasons with UCONN as director of soccer administration.

In his final year at UCONN, Mellon started working part-time with the United States Soccer Federation (U.S. Soccer) as a national team coordinator, working mainly with youth national teams, but also with the beach national team and the Paralympics national team. “At the time I wasn’t looking for a job, but wanted to learn how they operated from a logistics standpoint. They did some research on me and offered me the opportunity. In June of 2015, I was assigned to my first national team training camp (under-16 boys) in Fort Lauderdale, then from there, I knew I wanted to pursue a career in soccer operations,” he said. Mellon describes his first day putting on the U.S. Soccer crest as “the best day of my life.”

Working for U.S. Soccer meant very little time at home, so in 2019 Mellon returned to Connecticut to work as director of operations for Hartford Athletic, a new USL Championship franchise. After one season with Hartford, Bruce Arena, head coach for the New England Revolution, offered Mellon his dream job.  Arena, the most successful American soccer coach in history, knew of Mellon through his work at U.S. Soccer. For Mellon, this was another no-brainer. “This is where I have always wanted to be. As a kid, I wanted to play soccer, but of course, I wanted to be in Major League Soccer. I got here with hard work, dedication, sacrifice, and being better every day. Even on the worst days here, they are still the greatest, because I actually get to walk out onto a soccer field every day. I look around at these professional athletes and think this is my life. I’ve done it. I’ve made it.”

Regarding his successful and fulfilling career, Mellon said, “Overall, I give credit to Herkimer and Pepe for my successful path AND I am not done yet.”

“I still get choked up about it at times. It’s absolutely amazing.”

View the full issue of Connections online at herkimer.edu/alumni/connections-magazine/.