![\"Joe](\"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Joe-Masumiya.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nJOE MASUMIYA<\/p>\n
By Julie Diefendorf<\/p>\n
Special to The Sportspaper.org<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Kitsap Pumas continued to add to their talented roster with the signing of midfielder Joe Masumiya of Lakewood, Calif.<\/p>\n
Masumiya, who played at California State Bakersfield, follows in the footsteps of fellow CSB alums in Chuy Sanchez and Andy Devlin, who both played for the Pumas last year.<\/p>\n
“I always loved soccer but when I began playing in college was when I started thinking about playing at the professional level as a more serious option\u201d\u00a0Masumiya said.\u00a0\u201cChuy and Andy always talked so highly of their experience playing for Kitsap and working with coach Cammy (Cameron MacDonald) so when my college coach brought up the option to me I immediately jumped at pursuing this opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n
MacDonald also recognizes Masumiya as a player with the skill set to go on to play at the next level like previous Roadrunners Sanchez and Devlin.<\/p>\n
\u201cRichie Grant [CSUB head coach] and I both share the same philosophy on the game so when he brought Joe to me I had no hesitation in bringing him to the club. In the times I\u2019ve watched Joe he\u2019s always been able to take control of games and I\u2019m sure he\u2019ll prove to be a great addition to the squad.\u201d<\/p>\n
Masumiya followed his childhood passion through the youth club ranks with Cerritos Brigade Soccer Club and eventually went on to CBS where he \u00a0played a pivotal role for the Roadrunners men\u2019s soccer team by consistently adding stability to their midfield.<\/p>\n
However, Masumiya was also able to use his defensive prowess to turn defense into attack by contributing eight goals and creating 13 assists throughout his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlaying at Bakersfield was the ideal situation for me\u201d\u00a0Masumiya recalled.\u00a0\u201cI had the opportunity to learn from a lot of great players, develop my game and focus on my education.\u201d<\/p>\n
His love for Bakersfield showed in his outstanding play that earned him a Western Athletic Conference (WAC) All-Conference honorable mention nomination in 2012 and a WAC Second Team All-Conference nomination in 2013.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am very excited to start training everyday at a high level,\u201d said Masumiya, \u201cand I believe this experience will really help me to get better as a player. I loved going to school at Bakersfield but it will be really nice to just focus on soccer.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am so thankful to the Pumas organization for this opportunity to continue my soccer career and I hope to repay their belief in me by helping to bring back another national title.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
JOE MASUMIYA By Julie Diefendorf Special to The Sportspaper.org The Kitsap Pumas continued to add to their talented…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1580,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1579"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1579\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1581,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1579\/revisions\/1581"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1580"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.sportspaper.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}