Pastor Paul Nolz reflects on 40 years of coaching, ministry on the Eastern Shore at ESCBA

Pictured: Paul Nolz, right, was the speaker at the recent meeting of the Eastern Shore Christian Businessmen’s Association held at the Eastern Shore Yacht & Country Club. At left is ESCBA president Rhudy Naylor.

By Bill Sterling

Paul Nolz humbly says if you have done something for a long time, it only means you are getting old.

Many would argue vociferously with that statement, at least for him, knowing the legacy the 74-year-old Nolz has created in his role as the pastor at Eastern Shore Rock Church and as a soccer coach for youth ages 4 to 18 for 40 years now.

Nolz was the speaker at the Eastern Shore Christian Businessmen’s Association’s monthly luncheon recently and shared his faith and his journey from a boy growing up in Norfolk.

In March, the Rock Church of the Eastern Shore celebrated 50 years, starting at what was once a dance studio in Onley, moving to a building on North Street in Onancock and finally erecting a church on a 10-acre site on Route 13 outside of Onley in 1988.

Nolz assisted the pastor as a volunteer for the first four years of the church’s existence on the Eastern Shore and now has pastored the church with his wife Judy for the past 46 years.

In the early years, the Rock Church of the Eastern Shore couldn’t afford to pay Nolz a salary. At the suggestion of Jeannette Edwards, Nolz started a youth soccer camp, hoping to make a couple of hundred dollars so he could take his family off the Shore for a camping trip and a rare vacation.

That first year, there were six campers at the Paul Nolz Soccer Camp — and two of them were his children.

Two years later, 75 youth showed up at the soccer camp, forcing Nolz to call high school students he was coaching to help him manage such a large group.

“I was able to pay them, but the real value was showing my high school students how to interact positively with youth and gain the skills they would hopefully use with their own children one day,” Nolz notes.

The soccer camp grew to over 100 campers and continues today, some 40 years later. Nolz also runs a summer church camp that is free and offers a variety of sports as well as Biblical lessons.

Nolz sort of fell into coaching soccer in 1986 when he was late signing up his kids for a youth league just forming on the Shore. He was told registration was closed, but he could take some kids not chosen in the tryouts and add his kids to form another team if he was willing to be the coach.

“We were horrible,” recalls Nolz, “getting beat 10 or 12 to 0, but somehow in the tournament we beat a team that had trounced us in the regular season when one of my players — who had been diagnosed with cancer — scored a goal on a long shot that floated over the goalie’s head. I had learned enough by then to pack our goal with defenders and we won 1-0.”

Nolz never played organized soccer in high school, being what he calls an “an average wrestler” in the powerhouse Granby program that won 21 of 22 state championships under Billy Martin Sr. Competition was so tough on that team with two of Martin’s sons winning multiple state titles that Nolz fared better in AAU competition, qualifying for a national tournament.

Even without a soccer background, Nolz impressed enough parents of his youth soccer players that he was recommended to be the Nandua coach when the sport was first introduced to Accomack County high schools in 1993. When former Nandua principal Larry Thomas called with the offer, Nolz prayed on it, checked with his church board, and accepted the position.

Nolz found success early on, eventually winning numerous district titles, competing with much larger schools in Virginia Beach and Norfolk, and then claimed two state championships in 2003 and 2021.

He also took over the coaching duties for Nandua Middle School. “I wanted to have as much time with a boy or girl as possible, and by coaching at the middle school, I had seven years with a kid rather than just four,” he says, adding that when a boy or girl came out for the soccer team, their past was of no concern to him. “The slate was clean with me so far as anything he or she might have done in the past or what might have been their reputation.” He says he drew from his own background “that had some rough spots when I succumbed to peer pressure,” though he never had trouble with the law.

Nolz notes that coaching was never about winning for him, although he admits he liked to win. “I never coached to win a state championship or even a game. I was just trying to make a difference in people’s lives, and coaching for me was a great way to interact with young kids and make a connection.”

After winning a second state championship five years ago, Nolz coached one more year and then passed on coaching the high school and middle school teams to one of his former players, Miquel Diaz. Nolz still runs the summer soccer camps and officiates scholastic soccer games. He says he doesn’t know when he will retire completely, either from the church or soccer. “As long as I have the health and energy to change lives for the glory of God, I will keep doing it.”

Nolz paused his talk to the ESCBA twice for an emotional story about important people in his life. First, he spoke of the pain of losing a child, laying his hand on the shoulder of Phil Custis, who also lost a son in an automobile accident, and mourning the fact that Nolz’s son, Jonathan, would be giving him more grandbabies if he had not been a passenger in a 2007 wreck near Four Corner Plaza that claimed five lives when Jonathan was 21.

Nolz and his wife have two other children, a daughter, Holly, and a son Josh, who played soccer at Virginia Wesleyan and then with the Virginia Beach Mariners of the United Soccer League and later with the United States national beach soccer team at the 2007 FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup.

Nolz concluded his talk by praising his wife, Judy, whom he said has been so supportive in everything he does, not only making calls, running errands and performing countless other tasks, but also enduring the loneliness when he was away at soccer games so many nights. “The wives are the true heroes in any success we might have,” Paul told the group of men gathered at the ESCBA meeting at the Eastern Shore Yacht & Country Club.

One of the highlights of their 51-year marriage was the opportunity to run a missionary soccer camp in Fiji and Guatemala over the past eight years, giving them some memorable moments interacting with others who share their faith.

For more information about the Eastern Shore Christian Businessmen’s Association, contact president Rhudy Naylor at 757-710-9638 or email secretary Bill Sterling at [email protected].