Jay Heaps has been fired by the New England Revolution after six seasons at the helm of the club.
After many reports surfaced last night, ownership confirmed his departure early this morning with this announcement:
“As a club, we made the decision to remove Jay Heaps as the head coach of our team. We would like to thank Jay for his tremendous contributions to the club over his 15 years as a player and coach. Jay led us to our fifth MLS Cup appearance and our third US Open Cup Final. He made us all proud and as a former player of ours we are very happy to have helped him launch his coaching career and wish him nothing but the best of success in the future.
Our goal is to field a team each and every season that is competing for championships and over the past couple of seasons we have fallen short of that goal. We will immediately begin a search for a new head coach and are committed to seeing the New England Revolution once again return to championship contention.”
Assistant coach Tom Soehn has taken over for Heaps and will serve as interim manager for the remainder of the season.
Soehn first joined the Revolution in 2014 and has a backgrouund of being a head coach as well as as a player in the MLS. Soehn won the MLS Cup as a player in 1998 and the US Open Cup in 1998 and 2000, all with DC United. He also worked as an assistant coach under Bob Bradley with the Chicago Fire and under Peter Nowak with DC United, whom he took over for in 2006, winning the Supporters Shield with DC.
In 2010, Soehn joined the Vancouver White Caps as their Director of Soccer Operations. He made a brief return to coaching in 2011, taking over as interim manager in Vancouver after it fired the head coach, but returned to his front office position after a replacement was found.
Heaps leaves behind a polarizing legacy with the Revolution. A former player with the club from 2001-2009. Heaps was praised for taking what was considered to be a sub par Revolution squad to the MLS Cup Final in 2014, as well as getting to the US Open Cup Final in 2016.
However, the Revolution suffered following their Finals appearance in 2014, and Heaps emerged as the popular figure to blame. He recently came under fire following the Revolution’s unconvincing defeat to Atlanta United, when he left Kei Kamara and Teal Bunbury on the bench, when the pair had scored seven out of the Revolution’s last eight goals heading into the contest.
The fact the Revolution have gone a calendar year without an away win in MLS also did not help his cause.
Heaps posted this message to his twitter account, thanking fans, staff, players, the front office, and the owners.
1st official tweet but not my last. After parting ways with the Revs, I had a few thoughts to share and people to thank. I love u DJJLiv. pic.twitter.com/f6CPJAJyUz
— Jay Heaps (@JayHeaps722) September 19, 2017
While this move has appeased many of the New England faithful, they still desire more change, asking for General Manager Michael Burns to be fired, and even for Robert Kraft to sell the club altogether. Only time can tell if more changes are in store for the Revolution.
The Revolution’s next game is this Saturday, September 23rd at Gillette Stadium at 5 p.m. against Toronto FC.
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