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Greyson Ramburg is getting a taste for playing out in the field, and Nederland coach Keith Barrow believes the senior likes it.

“For him, just because he’s been in the goal for so long, he’s just been getting better and better each week,” Barrow said. “The more time he spends on the field, the better he gets. He’s somewhat of a blank slate. He’s been learning more and more of it, so he’s very eager to get out there.”

Ramburg scored two of Nederland’s three goals in Friday’s 3-0 win over Cleveland at Bulldog Stadium. He is The Port Arthur News Boys Athlete of the Week.

Ramburg is quick to acknowledge that much of the success he’s had in soccer is attributable to the whole Bulldog team.

“Really I owe all my play and all my accomplishments to them because everybody knows soccer isn’t a single-man sport,” he said. “Now I’m loving playing at Nederland and just having a great time my last year.”

The senior spent a year of his time in high school in New Braunfels, but is glad to be back playing for the Bulldogs.

“It’s awesome to be back with the players that I basically started playing with,” he said.

Ramburg is playing with a team that is very excited to be in second in District 21-5A rankings, and he says he and his team are playing like they’re fighting for the top spot.

Their passion showed in Friday’s game against Cleveland.

“We came together as a team,” he said. “We’ve been playing really hard in practice. I remember coach telling us before the game that we don’t have the second spot clinched just yet, but if we won, then we can’t get anything less than second place and we were fired up about that. We were training hard at practices before and it all just came together.”

Barrow said Ramburg was a big part of that team effort. He counted on Ramburg’s experience playing defense to put pressure on Cleveland’s outside backs.

“He understands what an outside back has to do and the passing angles that he’s trying to cut off,” Barrow said. “He was getting some steals that way, and he’s a pretty thick, strong guy, so he’s not going to be pushed around.”

Barrow attributes Ramburg’s fearlessness to his time as a goalkeeper. Now that he’s on the field, he’s translating that fearlessness into an aggressive attack.

“He’s scored some pretty good goals for us this year in some pretty tight spaces,” Barrow said. “He had a nice header goal a couple of weeks ago in the Barbers Hill game. Some kids would have backed off the last second. He and the goalie were getting there at the same time, but he got there half a second before and headed the ball in. That shows you the kind of hunger he has to score goals.”

Ramburg sees his strengths in his versatility.

“I’m very coachable,” he said. “I played goalkeeper. At the beginning of this year I played right back, got injured, and with coach’s faith he put me in at forward. My biggest strength is with how versatile I am and how well that works with the team when we need it.”

The Bulldogs will spend Spring Break off before playing at Dayton in the March 17 regular season finale.