Coach Tim Lenahan chuckles when he recalls his first impressions of senior midfielder Piero Bellizzi. Not that Bellizzi’s skills were any laughing matter- his blistering footwork and deft touch caught the eye of plenty of college scouts, including Lenahan.
But then, of course, Bellizzi was almost impossible not to spot. Playing at the Disney Showcase in Florida, Bellizzi was fresh off spending the first part of a year-long session in Italy training with Serie A side Udinese’s youth team.
And he had the hair to prove it.
“Oh yeah, we noticed him,” Lenahan said. “Besides the mullet that he had and I forget whatever color shoes he had on, but trust me, they were colored, he was very technical and had the ability to break guys down. The next time we saw him he wasn’t even playing but he was all Euro’d up even more, with his tight jeans on, and he had his yellow wrap around J-Lo glasses. Then he came to our camp and did a phenomenal job.”
Bellizzi has since lost the mullet but, fortunately for Northwestern, not the Euro-polished touch. In a program marked more by its relentless work ethic than mid-blowing finesse, Bellizzi’s flair on and off the field remain both an anomaly and the source of ample ribbing. Though he is no longer asked to play the technical forward that Lenahan first scouted, he has evolved into an efficient playmaker, leading the team with five assists on the season and ranking sixth in the Big Ten in that category.
“He is definitely the most skilled player on the team and I think we all know that,” junior forward Oliver Kupe said. “But he’s also just this huge personality both on and off the field. He’s a party all the time and you can just tell that he is having fun because he loves the game.”
It’s a love that extends all the way back to Bellizzi’s hometown of Rye, New York. Growing up in an Italian-American family that relished only one type of football, he said that soccer was always his “only thing.”
Bellizzi, whose father played soccer at Queens College, plays with the ease of someone who lives and breathes the sport.
“It was 100 percent a family thing for me,” Bellizzi said. “I didn’t actually even start cheering for any American sports, like football or baseball until I got here and realized the whole Chicago sports thing. And I realized I’m from New York so people expect me to cheer for our teams. For me it’s always been about the soccer.”
When Bellizzi was 16, he went to Italy to train with Udinese’s youth program and found that he was finally in a place where everything, and everyone, was about soccer. It’s a trip that Bellizzi said gave him an edge in his first season with the Wildcats.
“Both soccer-wise and off the field it kind of affected me a lot,” Bellizzi said. “Playing with those players kind of taught me that they’re not just gonna give you your success, you have to earn it. I was a little young and I was a little bit of a momma’s boy, having to earn things kind of was new to me on the field as well as off the field. It was good to learn before going to college.”
Bellizzi got an additional edge when he enrolled in classes at NU during the winter and spring terms before the fall of his freshman year. He used this time to adapt to life in the Midwest and train with the team, something Bellizzi said made the transition to college ball much smoother.
Bellizzi entered his first regular season with fellow freshman and now NU’s all-time leading goal scorer, Matt Eliason, as part of an offensive package Lenahan recruited to replace a graduation-depleted attack. The two made an odd couple; Eliason, an Illinois native, possesses a more reserved personality and attacking style. But both had big seasons, with Bellizzi notching eight assists and Big Ten Freshman of the Year honors.
Since then, Bellizzi’s role has evolved as the program has lost some of its offensive dynamism. Bellizzi is now asked to contribute defensively, as well as to serve up his signature free kicks and fuel the attack from the flank.During Sunday’s pivotal draw with Penn State,
Bellizzi helped to contain a potent Nittany Lions attack, and he also played the overlapping pass that would set up the Cats’ lone goal.
As much as he has matured as a player, Lenahan said that Bellizzi has retained much of the same outspoken and oversized personality he had as a precocious freshman. This season his references to Pauly D of Jersey Shore fame have kept the team entertained.
“The game is made up of piano players and piano movers and Piero is definitely a piano player,” Lenahan said. “But this is a game where you’ve still got to move the piano once in a while. So you know he adds a different dimension to us as a team in terms of his skillfulness, and I think he’s starting to pitch in on the other end as well.”
NU (6-5-2) will need strong performances at both ends of the field at Loyola Chicago (3-7-2) Wednesday night. Heading into the home stretch of its regular season, NU is facing a must-win situation in its last four matchups in order to earn a guaranteed berth in the 48-team NCAA tournament.
NU ranked a dismal 89th in the recently released RPI rankings, but Sunday’s draw with Penn State keeps the Cats in tournament contention.
“It’s definitely weird because in my past four years we’ve always started out really hot,” Bellizzi said. “This year that’s obviously not true. But in the past we’ve started out strong and plateaued in the playoffs. This year we could peak at just the right time-playoffs.”
