Staff Spotlight: Octavia Saunders

Kings Hammer Soccer Club is excited to welcome our new Director of Video Analysis and Data Analytics Octavia Saunders. She joins our team with a wide array of experience stemming from her time coaching at the collegiate level, including a stint as the Associate Head Coach for UNC Charlotte. 

Born in Devon, England, Octavia— or Ocky as she’s known to most people— spent much of her childhood around the game of soccer. At just 16 years old, she joined the Bristol City Academy where she played semi-professionally. While there, Ocky would win six UK National Titles in three years, also attending multiple England national camps. She attributes her time there sparking her idea of coaching, saying, “I learned how to be a coach out of that too. I’m looking at the mentors and coaches there, and it helped me develop so much as a player and what I would pull away from them now as a coach.” 

A move stateside would await Ocky as she would attend the University of Montevallo in Alabama, playing soccer while pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Kinesiology and Exercise Science. From there, she never looked back, finding herself coaching at several universities including Brevard College, Salem College and most recently UNC Charlotte, all the while taking on various roles with NC Fusion. 

During her time at UNC Charlotte, she ran the scouting program, implementing film review into part of the team’s training. “After the game, I would watch our film, tag moments and pull those tags, which would go directly to our players,” Ocky said. “So, they could look up their profiles and see every moment that I tagged them, either learning moments or good moments.”

She feels as though this resource can be extremely helpful to younger players, saying “I think it’s such a big tool for players to learn and grow, and to help them see the game from a different view.” 

As the Director of Video Analysis and Data Analytics, she will look to bring a similar tool to the coaches of Kings Hammer Soccer Club. While the program is still in its first few steps, Ocky hopes to strengthen the resource quickly in her first year.  

Her immediate aim is to build a tool for coaches and players alike to be able to take a step back and look at things differently. She plans for the tool to be as streamlined as possible with a focus on ease of use so it can be implemented at all levels, revolutionizing training for all teams. 

On top of her national role, Ocky also serves as head coaches of two Kings Hammer teams. 

We’re so happy to welcome Ocky into our Kings Hammer family, and we can’t wait to see all the great things that she does!