Casey Schot had lifelong passion for soccer

Kees (Casey) Schot loved the camaraderie of soccer.

He grew up playing in the Netherlands and stayed with the sport for nearly 50 years after he emigrated to Minneapolis. He was a board member in Minnesota soccer associations and refereed games until he was 70.

He also enjoyed Dutch clog shoe dancing and playing the harmonica.

"His true passion was being around other people," said Steve Tietz, who played soccer with him. Schot liked the tournament trips to Chicago and Thunder Bay, Ontario, and the postgame socializing, he said.

Schot, 76, died of colon cancer Saturday in a Brooklyn Center hospice, said his daughter, Dawn Klotzbach, of West St. Paul. She said he had watched most of the World Cup games, but death spared him from seeing his native Netherlands lose to Spain in Sunday's finals.

"He was a good guy, a great referee and a good soccer supporter," said state Appeals Court Judge Gordan Shumaker, who said he refereed with Schot at the top state level in the 1970s and '80s, including college games and the state high school soccer league tournaments.

"I remember him as always a gentleman" and a patient referee, Shumaker said. "He was always respected by the players. Whether they agreed with his calls or not, they knew he would treat them respectfully."

Schot served on the boards of the state referee and soccer associations, said Ron Mettler, a former president of the Minnesota Soccer Association. Schot, who spent most of his career as an accountant for Video Midwest, was the association's treasurer for several years. Schot was elected to the Minnesota Amateur Soccer Hall of Fame, said fellow referee Ricardo Gonzalo.

Schot arrived in Minneapolis at age 23 from a large, poor family in World War II-torn Rotterdam, his daughter said. He served in the U.S. Navy, got married, and started playing soccer with the Minneapolis Kickers in the late 1950s. His three kids grew up watching their dad, a deft wing, speed down the sidelines.

"We were always screwing around in the back yard with a soccer ball. It was always, 'Try to get the ball away from Papa,'" Klotzbach said. As they grew, she and a brother became linesmen refs, helping their father officiate.

"He knows where every soccer field is in the metro area and also where every Dairy Queen is," she said.

Schot is also survived by a son, Dirk Schot, of Minneapolis; another daughter, Marianne Golmitz, of Macon, Ga.; a brother, Jan Schot of Pappendrecht, Holland; two sisters, Zuus Edel of Pappendrecht and Joke Garcia of Copenhagen, Denmark, and five grandchildren.