Mike Pantalione used to have to resort to telling tall tales – now his program’s record just sounds like one.

Yavapai College of Prescott, Arizona, captured its seventh NJCAA national title this past November with an unheard of 26-0-0 perfect mark.

The Roughriders have ransacked the Arizona junior college scene for the past 20 years compiling a 443-29-13 mark and tallying 20 conference championships.

Those are unseemly numbers for any program, and an especially far cry from what Pantalione remembers when he took over Yavapai in its inaugural season of men’s soccer in 1989.

“In order to recruit guys starting out, I would go to any length. I told kids that Yavapai was a Native American term that meant ‘winning soccer,’” said coach Pantalione. “A couple of times I tried to explain to kids ‘hey, this is the way we do things around here …’ they had to remind me, ‘what do you mean coach, this is the first year?’”

Pantalione hasn’t had to explain much since - the record kind of speaks for itself. Pantalione won a championship with that first recruiting class and things have kind of snowballed from there.

Alongside assistant Hugh Bell, who’s spent 17 years with the school, the two are the only men’s soccer coaches the school has seen. Together they’ve built a standard of excellence that’s hard to match.

Pantalione once coached soccer at Wisconsin-Green Bay and Montana, but at Yavapai - about 90 miles north of Phoenix - he finds a unique opportunity.

“The opportunity to help young men succeed and see them off to bigger and better things is the goal,” he said. “We’ve had players play for us and go on to play in the MLS (including Alan Gordon and Mike Randolph of the Los Angeles Galaxy), we had a player compete in the 2006 World Cup. We’re interested in recruiting any kid who’s hungry to use education and soccer as a means to new heights.”

This past season Pantalione’s philosophy was on full display as his team achieved perfection.

Led by a stingy backline that included Chris Hunter, Dirk Petersen, Evan McNiel and Jeff Bendawald the Roughriders recorded 15 shutouts and never allowed more than one goal in any contest.

Francis Khamis and Justin Meram carried the bulk of the load on offense. Khamis scored 30 goals, giving him a school-record 53 for his career, while Meram attained a school-record 132 points including 80 this season.

“There’s no secret; the key is hard work and you have to have a little bit of luck,” Pantalione said. “This was a special season capped off by an immaculate record. We’ve been fortunate in our 20 year history. It’s been a good run.”