High school soccer: Viewmont's Colton Cook named 'Mr. Soccer'

Last weekend, Viewmont boys soccer coach Dave Wigham fielded a telephone call from the mother of one of his freshman players.

She wanted to get the veteran coach's opinion on where her son should play club ball, and when Wigham asked the mom what her son wanted to get out of club soccer, the reply was simple, "He wants to be just like Cookie."

When you examine the kind of season that Viewmont senior midfielder Colton Cook, who is nicknamed Cookie, had on the soccer field this spring, and when you look at what kind of a person he is, it isn't hard to see why his young teammate wants to be like him.

Given new-found freedom this year, Cook was spectacular from the start of the season to the finish. In the eyes of the Deseret News, Cook enjoyed the best individual season of anyone in the state and, as a result, has been named the inaugural recipient of the Deseret News Mr. Soccer award.

Wigham has presided over a host of outstanding boys and girls soccer players over the years, but when you talk to him about Cook, it doesn't take long to figure out how special he thinks he is.

"He's one of those once-in-a-lifetime players," said Wigham. "When the ball was at his feet, I was on my feet. I got excited. When he had the ball, it felt like something special was going to happen."

It isn't exactly rocket science to point out that athletes can respond vastly different to various situations.

Such was the case with Cook, who was a solid player a year ago under highly-successful coach Casey Layton but sometimes struggled in the rigid and no-nonsense system that the Vikes employed.

However, Layton vacated his coaching position after last season to become an administrator, and Wigham made it clear from Day 1 that things would be much different for Cook in 2008.

The senior-to-be was told he would be in the middle, that he would have the green light to do whatever he saw fit and that he should be as creative as possible.

Surrounded by a talented supporting cast, the results were pretty spectacular once he got on the field.

"The chains," said Wigham, "were taken off him this year."

From Wigham's point of view, Cook's fantastic season got going in Viewmont's Region 1-opener against Northridge. Down 1-0 at halftime, Cook made it clear to his teammates that it was gonna be OK.

"He just kind of said, 'Guys, we're fine. We're not gonna lose this game,'" recalled Wigham.