Can you name the soccer field in the background? It played an important part in a US soccer
players career.
Background
So let me set the context of this information. My son is a soccer player. He has the desire to play college soccer. He has had that for awhile. In an effort to help him reach his goal, I have researched, guided and pushed him into what I thought was the right path to get there. We are not there yet and it we be an interesting "Rest of the Story" (i.e. you have to be old enough to know who Paul Harvey is to get that).
As we have worked our way along this path, I have gained a lot of insight that I didn't have when I began and did not really find in seminars on college recruiting or through web research. Due to difficulties we have encountered, I constantly wished that I had found out information earlier. Therefore, I felt it would be a benefit to share this experience. I hope it will help others venturing down the same path.
Obviously this unloading of information is based on ability. If my son was a recruit at Notre Dame (won the NCAA D1 National Championship in 2013) I probably wouldn't be writing this. But he is not. I feel he is a very good soccer player and in the upper part of the players in his age group. His club team which plays in the US Youth Soccer program won there state tournament. He played in a US Youth Soccer Region 3 tournament. He is also a member of the state Olympic Development Program and has attended a Region 3 ODP camp. His high school team won their region and made it to the 2nd round of the state playoffs. Through the region playoffs and ODP at no time was he way below the players on the field. I feel his abilities are in line with the other players in all the competitions he participated in.... and I attended them all.
As we have worked our way along this path, I have gained a lot of insight that I didn't have when I began and did not really find in seminars on college recruiting or through web research. Due to difficulties we have encountered, I constantly wished that I had found out information earlier. Therefore, I felt it would be a benefit to share this experience. I hope it will help others venturing down the same path.
Obviously this unloading of information is based on ability. If my son was a recruit at Notre Dame (won the NCAA D1 National Championship in 2013) I probably wouldn't be writing this. But he is not. I feel he is a very good soccer player and in the upper part of the players in his age group. His club team which plays in the US Youth Soccer program won there state tournament. He played in a US Youth Soccer Region 3 tournament. He is also a member of the state Olympic Development Program and has attended a Region 3 ODP camp. His high school team won their region and made it to the 2nd round of the state playoffs. Through the region playoffs and ODP at no time was he way below the players on the field. I feel his abilities are in line with the other players in all the competitions he participated in.... and I attended them all.
Why?
Through my years coaching my son and helping him in his goal of playing college soccer, I have fell in
love with the sport. As I mention below, I played basketball growing up and the similarities between
the two sports are amazing. My exposure to soccer was a Saturday clinic put on by several players from Coastal Carolina (which at that time was part of the University of South Carolina system) in 1976.
My memory of that day was "wow this is a lot of running". That was it until my oldest started playimg
YMCA soccer through our elementary school.
I have also developed an opinion about US soccer. I can say it is reflected in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mXG0QX5CH0&index=35&list=FLXSZpEXjKhRWsdBxXI6R7qQ
So, I don't want the US to be European Soccer, South American Soccer or any other kind.
I want it to be American Soccer. We are behind the curve in terms of time playing the game,
but we are catching up. But we need to find OUR WAY. Not some other way.
With that said, youth soccer in America has the largest participation of any youth sport. Yet, when
these kids grow up and have the chance to move to the next level.... well that is what this is about.
For me that meant, getting my son to play college soccer.
I want to share my experiences about that in a general way. By that I mean, I don't want to focus on the benefits of this club or that club. I don't want to pick on a specific college. I want to develop general ideas that will be useful for parents as they explore and help their child explore playing college soccer.
I will have to be gender specific in my observations as I have a son and my exploration has been on the men's soccer side of the world. I will however reference women's college soccer information. I used it in my inital explorations on line to learn more about playing college soccer. One great web article I found was by Michael McNeish of the Lehigh Valley United FC
http://www.sambasoccer.org/college/mcneish_article_1.htm
I will also be geographically focused on the southeast. I live in South Carolina and our focus on colleges has been within a 300 mile-ish radius of our state.
I was a high school athlete. I lettered in football, basketball, and track. I also played golf one year and played baseball all the way up until high school. But in the late 1970's in rural South Carolina there was not a lot of soccer anywhere. It was Friday night football or Tuesday and Friday night basketball.
Also I was not versed in the ins and outs of getting to play college sports. No one in my high school career (my freshman to senior year -- that I can remember) got a scholarship to any college. So using Michael's article above and other information I gathered on the Internet and panel discussions I had attended I started developing a plan of attack. But first step was to decide what colleges to express interest in....
love with the sport. As I mention below, I played basketball growing up and the similarities between
the two sports are amazing. My exposure to soccer was a Saturday clinic put on by several players from Coastal Carolina (which at that time was part of the University of South Carolina system) in 1976.
My memory of that day was "wow this is a lot of running". That was it until my oldest started playimg
YMCA soccer through our elementary school.
I have also developed an opinion about US soccer. I can say it is reflected in this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1mXG0QX5CH0&index=35&list=FLXSZpEXjKhRWsdBxXI6R7qQ
So, I don't want the US to be European Soccer, South American Soccer or any other kind.
I want it to be American Soccer. We are behind the curve in terms of time playing the game,
but we are catching up. But we need to find OUR WAY. Not some other way.
With that said, youth soccer in America has the largest participation of any youth sport. Yet, when
these kids grow up and have the chance to move to the next level.... well that is what this is about.
For me that meant, getting my son to play college soccer.
I want to share my experiences about that in a general way. By that I mean, I don't want to focus on the benefits of this club or that club. I don't want to pick on a specific college. I want to develop general ideas that will be useful for parents as they explore and help their child explore playing college soccer.
I will have to be gender specific in my observations as I have a son and my exploration has been on the men's soccer side of the world. I will however reference women's college soccer information. I used it in my inital explorations on line to learn more about playing college soccer. One great web article I found was by Michael McNeish of the Lehigh Valley United FC
http://www.sambasoccer.org/college/mcneish_article_1.htm
I will also be geographically focused on the southeast. I live in South Carolina and our focus on colleges has been within a 300 mile-ish radius of our state.
I was a high school athlete. I lettered in football, basketball, and track. I also played golf one year and played baseball all the way up until high school. But in the late 1970's in rural South Carolina there was not a lot of soccer anywhere. It was Friday night football or Tuesday and Friday night basketball.
Also I was not versed in the ins and outs of getting to play college sports. No one in my high school career (my freshman to senior year -- that I can remember) got a scholarship to any college. So using Michael's article above and other information I gathered on the Internet and panel discussions I had attended I started developing a plan of attack. But first step was to decide what colleges to express interest in....
Beginning Research
So here are the Division 1 colleges in the southeast
From this graphic note that Alabama has only 1 Division 1 team. Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia only have 2 and Georgia only has 3.
And here are the Division 2 colleges
A couple notes about the Division 2 schools. In general they have some faith affiliation (i.e. Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Catholic, etc.). Also note that Virginia has no Division 2 soccer schools listed on the NCAA web site.
I have not shown the Division 3 schools. First, D3 schools offer no scholarships. In my opinion they seem like a souped up college club team.... but this perception is not really based on any facts. Second, there are no D3 schools in South Carolina. So I have no knowledge of how this programs work..... thus my perception. But they do appear in our process of exploration.... as we will see later.
And here are the Division 2 colleges
A couple notes about the Division 2 schools. In general they have some faith affiliation (i.e. Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Catholic, etc.). Also note that Virginia has no Division 2 soccer schools listed on the NCAA web site.
I have not shown the Division 3 schools. First, D3 schools offer no scholarships. In my opinion they seem like a souped up college club team.... but this perception is not really based on any facts. Second, there are no D3 schools in South Carolina. So I have no knowledge of how this programs work..... thus my perception. But they do appear in our process of exploration.... as we will see later.
Pick Schools ..... Reach Out
During the research my son attended and ID camp at the University of South Carolina in January of his junior high school year. The head coach Mark Berson gave a recruiting talk. My son had attended the Furman University soccer camp for 3 years before and heard many of the same things in their recruiting seminar. There were some interesting differences though. The biggest was in the method of contacting a coach. Furman suggested sending paper letter to the coach. South Carolina said email was fine. Furman said do not use any recruiting web sites. South Carolina said is was OK, but they didn't spend a lot of time on the recruiting web sites.
Based on the suggestions of Coach Berson, I helped my son develop a one page soccer resume. I like this suggestion based on my business and military experience. It showed his club, high school and ODP coach information, his academic information, his accomplishments in soccer at in other areas. We also decided on email as a contact method followed by a recruiting site.
So with these maps in mind my son and I picked 5 Division 1 schools and 4 Division 2 schools. He developed template email and then personalized it to each school based on his research on their academic programs. His selections were based on the degree program offered, the size of the school and how well they did in their conference. So off they went the emails with the soccer resume attached and he waited for replies.
I also suggested he create a web presence. Being a business person I understood how folks use the internet to create contact.... electronic networking.... as opposed to the old physical networking through conversations and phone calls. We first tried to create a web page on my business server. But we finally settled on using a recruiting site, CaptainU. CaptainU has a method to contact coaches. We decided to use this method as a secondary method besides emails just to be redundant for our 9 schools. We also used it for some fringe schools. These were schools that were high in the national soccer rankings and felt like would be a long shot to get into their soccer program and where getting direct email addresses is difficult..
Based on the suggestions of Coach Berson, I helped my son develop a one page soccer resume. I like this suggestion based on my business and military experience. It showed his club, high school and ODP coach information, his academic information, his accomplishments in soccer at in other areas. We also decided on email as a contact method followed by a recruiting site.
So with these maps in mind my son and I picked 5 Division 1 schools and 4 Division 2 schools. He developed template email and then personalized it to each school based on his research on their academic programs. His selections were based on the degree program offered, the size of the school and how well they did in their conference. So off they went the emails with the soccer resume attached and he waited for replies.
I also suggested he create a web presence. Being a business person I understood how folks use the internet to create contact.... electronic networking.... as opposed to the old physical networking through conversations and phone calls. We first tried to create a web page on my business server. But we finally settled on using a recruiting site, CaptainU. CaptainU has a method to contact coaches. We decided to use this method as a secondary method besides emails just to be redundant for our 9 schools. We also used it for some fringe schools. These were schools that were high in the national soccer rankings and felt like would be a long shot to get into their soccer program and where getting direct email addresses is difficult..
Responses come in...
So with the emails out and the contacts made on CaptainU a few replies started coming in. That was good news. In general the replies were positive. But in general the common refrain was you need to come to our summer camp or ID camp. So the summer between my son's Junior and Senior year he attended 5 camps (3 College camps, 1 ID camp and the Region 3 ODP camp).
Now besides just setting up a CaptainU account, we also created a YouTube page with videos of several games and a video highlights. I thought this would be more useful. I thought it would allow coaches to see my son's abilities without having to travel everywhere. I also thought it might extend his reach in terms of colleges that might see him. It turns out... both of these perceptions were wrong. I don't think the videos help very much. Basically every coach wanted to see you play in person. I think they also wanted to have the personal interaction, like a job interview. Therefore, the phase "pay to play" became very apparent.
CaptainU also provides access to their database to coaches. I assume all college coaches have access to these sites for free. What is interesting is that the coaches can create a search criteria and look for players based on these criteria (i.e. right footed, played ODP, GPA 4.0 or higher, etc). I haven't seen the coaches side so these are assumptions on my part. Every time your profile comes up in a search, you get an email. That is good. You can then reach out to the coach and introduce yourself. I thought this might get my son some interest beyond the 9 schools he had chosen. Over the 1 year we have been on the web site, my son's profile has popped up approximately 75 times. So this is good news right? Well not so much. Of the 75 times.... only 8 or so were D1 schools... probably another 15 were D2 schools. The majority were D3, Jr. College or NAIA D1 or D2. Now NAIA D1 is not bad, but we have no NAIA D1 schools in SC. So these were all good distances from home. So the end result, not much help, at least not D1 or D2. When you get a CaptainU message from a NAIA D2 school in Missouri to a player in South Carolina (1000 miles) saying he has some openings and based on your profile you could fill one of them.. no offer, just a suggestion...it seems like he might be having a hard time finding players that want to attend his school.. and that is a significant distance to travel for a maybe.
Now besides just setting up a CaptainU account, we also created a YouTube page with videos of several games and a video highlights. I thought this would be more useful. I thought it would allow coaches to see my son's abilities without having to travel everywhere. I also thought it might extend his reach in terms of colleges that might see him. It turns out... both of these perceptions were wrong. I don't think the videos help very much. Basically every coach wanted to see you play in person. I think they also wanted to have the personal interaction, like a job interview. Therefore, the phase "pay to play" became very apparent.
CaptainU also provides access to their database to coaches. I assume all college coaches have access to these sites for free. What is interesting is that the coaches can create a search criteria and look for players based on these criteria (i.e. right footed, played ODP, GPA 4.0 or higher, etc). I haven't seen the coaches side so these are assumptions on my part. Every time your profile comes up in a search, you get an email. That is good. You can then reach out to the coach and introduce yourself. I thought this might get my son some interest beyond the 9 schools he had chosen. Over the 1 year we have been on the web site, my son's profile has popped up approximately 75 times. So this is good news right? Well not so much. Of the 75 times.... only 8 or so were D1 schools... probably another 15 were D2 schools. The majority were D3, Jr. College or NAIA D1 or D2. Now NAIA D1 is not bad, but we have no NAIA D1 schools in SC. So these were all good distances from home. So the end result, not much help, at least not D1 or D2. When you get a CaptainU message from a NAIA D2 school in Missouri to a player in South Carolina (1000 miles) saying he has some openings and based on your profile you could fill one of them.. no offer, just a suggestion...it seems like he might be having a hard time finding players that want to attend his school.. and that is a significant distance to travel for a maybe.
Soccer Camps and ID Camps
The real reason for both of these events is an unanswered question.
My hope was, and I think most parents think, that these camps create exposure for
their kid to the coaches of a particular college. And that through this exposure the
kid might have an opportunity to get a spot on that college team. Especially as the
player approaches high school graduation.
When my son was younger, we sent him to Furman for their camp. Their program had a good reputation (can I say Client Dempsey) and I thought it would help my son's skills and game knowledge grow. Also it was a way to jump into the pool in search for a college opportunity.
Statement 2 is true. My son attended this camp 3 years and with several of his club teammates. They had
a good time socially and played a lot of soccer for a week. I felt like it improved his game and was
worth the investment.
Statement 1, in my opinion is false. I will cover this a little more later.... but as an example, my son again
attended a USC ID camp January. They announced their signings in February. They signed 1kid
from Norway, 1 kid from France, 1 kid was a Junior transfer from another school in SC, 1 kid from
Texas and 1 from Virginia. There were approximately 80 kids at this ID camp. They came from as far away as Missouri (10 hours) and Illinois. The license plates in the parking lot were amazing. I don't think any of them had a chance for a spot on the team. This was similar the year before.
Of course these are money making events. I have heard of college coaches with contracts that
allow them to personally keep the profits from the summer camps and ID camps. So these are
actually businesses. This can become a significant amount if the camp is $600, the actual cost
per camper is say $300 and you have 200 kids..($60K) This seems to be more true of the
larger D1 camps.
In my opinion, unless you are personally, not a chain letter or marketing letter... I mean a direct coach discussion type email.. not one way (i.e. he sends one to you.... you respond... no answer) asked to
attend and ID camp, there is not much benefit. It is not zero benefit. They see you enough, they may
try to help you out... but the cost/benefit ratio is very small.
When my son got a personal invite, and to a D2 camp (i.e. smaller school), I thought he got a fair
shake from the coach. He got looked at and got personal feedback that was not the general mumbo jumbo stuff. As a parent I felt my money was worth it, even if the outcome was not what I wanted.
But if you do attend and ID camp... and after some direct conversation with a coach, he will want to
see you in person... understand this is not normal soccer !! This is a pick up game with a group of
players of varying skill. So don't expect to wall pass a player and get the ball right back. My son
made this mistake several times. Having played ODP ball, he was use to possession type soccer,
relieve pressure by passing back, work the ball to the 18 and create a scoring opportunity...
Not so at an ID camp. If you do that you will get the critique that my son got..... "he is not having
an impact on the game"... huh? I thought that was good soccer? It is.... good TEAM soccer.
ID camps are not about TEAM, they are about players. Another critique is "his speed of play
is to slow".... speed of play is based on who you are playing with (remember varied skill levels),
so it is difficult to show that ability in folks not at your level.
The moral of the story, and I had my son's high school coach talk to him about this.... he played college
soccer.... to one, be more direct... take people on... don't relieve pressure... and two pick out a
few players at your skill level... create a quick friendship and show bursts of speed of play.
You need to show off your strengths... and TEAM play is not a skill in this environment they are
looking for. That is something that I guess they assume will come later...
My hope was, and I think most parents think, that these camps create exposure for
their kid to the coaches of a particular college. And that through this exposure the
kid might have an opportunity to get a spot on that college team. Especially as the
player approaches high school graduation.
When my son was younger, we sent him to Furman for their camp. Their program had a good reputation (can I say Client Dempsey) and I thought it would help my son's skills and game knowledge grow. Also it was a way to jump into the pool in search for a college opportunity.
Statement 2 is true. My son attended this camp 3 years and with several of his club teammates. They had
a good time socially and played a lot of soccer for a week. I felt like it improved his game and was
worth the investment.
Statement 1, in my opinion is false. I will cover this a little more later.... but as an example, my son again
attended a USC ID camp January. They announced their signings in February. They signed 1kid
from Norway, 1 kid from France, 1 kid was a Junior transfer from another school in SC, 1 kid from
Texas and 1 from Virginia. There were approximately 80 kids at this ID camp. They came from as far away as Missouri (10 hours) and Illinois. The license plates in the parking lot were amazing. I don't think any of them had a chance for a spot on the team. This was similar the year before.
Of course these are money making events. I have heard of college coaches with contracts that
allow them to personally keep the profits from the summer camps and ID camps. So these are
actually businesses. This can become a significant amount if the camp is $600, the actual cost
per camper is say $300 and you have 200 kids..($60K) This seems to be more true of the
larger D1 camps.
In my opinion, unless you are personally, not a chain letter or marketing letter... I mean a direct coach discussion type email.. not one way (i.e. he sends one to you.... you respond... no answer) asked to
attend and ID camp, there is not much benefit. It is not zero benefit. They see you enough, they may
try to help you out... but the cost/benefit ratio is very small.
When my son got a personal invite, and to a D2 camp (i.e. smaller school), I thought he got a fair
shake from the coach. He got looked at and got personal feedback that was not the general mumbo jumbo stuff. As a parent I felt my money was worth it, even if the outcome was not what I wanted.
But if you do attend and ID camp... and after some direct conversation with a coach, he will want to
see you in person... understand this is not normal soccer !! This is a pick up game with a group of
players of varying skill. So don't expect to wall pass a player and get the ball right back. My son
made this mistake several times. Having played ODP ball, he was use to possession type soccer,
relieve pressure by passing back, work the ball to the 18 and create a scoring opportunity...
Not so at an ID camp. If you do that you will get the critique that my son got..... "he is not having
an impact on the game"... huh? I thought that was good soccer? It is.... good TEAM soccer.
ID camps are not about TEAM, they are about players. Another critique is "his speed of play
is to slow".... speed of play is based on who you are playing with (remember varied skill levels),
so it is difficult to show that ability in folks not at your level.
The moral of the story, and I had my son's high school coach talk to him about this.... he played college
soccer.... to one, be more direct... take people on... don't relieve pressure... and two pick out a
few players at your skill level... create a quick friendship and show bursts of speed of play.
You need to show off your strengths... and TEAM play is not a skill in this environment they are
looking for. That is something that I guess they assume will come later...
Feedback .... "You are good on the ball, but"
I as a parent, wanted my son to get some feedback from the camp. It is amazing that very very few
of them he attended had a personal one-on-one coach feedback session. Furman summer camp that he attended when he was younger did, but the later ones did not. Many of the ID camps ended with a
"Thanks for coming, have a nice day". I thought to myself, you got to be kidding me. I spend $100-$200 just to register, then hours of travel and food and all I get was "Have a nice day". So I made my son send a follow up email to all the coaches asking for feedback. Also, we only attended ID camps that he had sent an "I am interested in your soccer program" email with his soccer resume attached. So the feed back was in this train of emails.
So what did he get back.... in many cases nothing. Often it took several emails. I one case 8 emails to assistant coaches... the finally one to the head coach. I had searched the web in hidden corners to find his college address. Only when this email was sent did a reply come back from the assistant coach.
And you can guess what the replies were. Basically we are not interested in you. The would often site your strong points... but in the end they would list several common excuses for not offering you a place. I have mentioned them already. And they came from multiple coaches, "Impact on the match", "Speed of play" and "physicality for this league". So most of the responses were negative.
So as this begins to pile up, you have to step back and evaluate where you are. "Maybe my son is not good enough?"
of them he attended had a personal one-on-one coach feedback session. Furman summer camp that he attended when he was younger did, but the later ones did not. Many of the ID camps ended with a
"Thanks for coming, have a nice day". I thought to myself, you got to be kidding me. I spend $100-$200 just to register, then hours of travel and food and all I get was "Have a nice day". So I made my son send a follow up email to all the coaches asking for feedback. Also, we only attended ID camps that he had sent an "I am interested in your soccer program" email with his soccer resume attached. So the feed back was in this train of emails.
So what did he get back.... in many cases nothing. Often it took several emails. I one case 8 emails to assistant coaches... the finally one to the head coach. I had searched the web in hidden corners to find his college address. Only when this email was sent did a reply come back from the assistant coach.
And you can guess what the replies were. Basically we are not interested in you. The would often site your strong points... but in the end they would list several common excuses for not offering you a place. I have mentioned them already. And they came from multiple coaches, "Impact on the match", "Speed of play" and "physicality for this league". So most of the responses were negative.
So as this begins to pile up, you have to step back and evaluate where you are. "Maybe my son is not good enough?"
New Research on who is getting signed...
So with the question of ability, an analysis was begun. The premise was to first answer the following questions:
1. What is the resume of kids getting signed to the D1 schools in SC?
2. Where are the geographically from?
3. Did they play ODP?
4. What about D2 schools?
5. What are the NCAA statistics and how do these number compare?
The idea was how does my son's resume stack up against the kids getting on D1 and D2 teams.
Also to identify trends in this data.
I gathered this data in two directions. First, I looked at all the South Carolina schools. Now every kid in SC doesn't play in SC. Our state high school coaches association tries to post at the SC soccer athletes that get a spot on a college team. So the data is presented as SC Schools and SC Athletes.
Spring 2014 - D1
Spring 2014 - D2
First, more information is available from the D1 schools in terms on signings. They often provide a little bio that tells their soccer background. This allows more anecdotal information to be considered. The D2 schools don't usually do this. So the conclusions are based mostly from the numbers and what little information is available.
My observations on from this small set of data;
For D1
1. D1 schools are taking a lot of academy players. Also the club players they do choose are playing at the
highest levels of youth soccer (for US Youth Soccer that is Primer teams.... at a minimum Challenge).
2. Almost 1/4 of the players recruited in D1 are foreign.
3. The South Carolina schools are only signing about 1/4 of their players from their home state.
For D2
1. Almost 1/2 of the recruits are foreign.
2. I could find few, if any, academy players signing to D2 schools.
3. Again, the South Carolina schools are only signing about 1/4 of their players from their home state.
The pursuit of academy players is kind of interesting , in that my understanding of the Academy was a way around college soccer. US Soccer does not like college soccer because of the format and schedule. It was also there way to get their hooks into the MLS academies that were already existing.
Transfers is the other source of signings. Actually more than I expected.
And of course, foreign players. How do these players end up in the US? That is a good question. My opinion is that it occurs mostly 2 ways; through friends that are already playing here and through foreign companies that sole purpose is to position foreign players at US colleges.
So what are the NCAA numbers?
1. What is the resume of kids getting signed to the D1 schools in SC?
2. Where are the geographically from?
3. Did they play ODP?
4. What about D2 schools?
5. What are the NCAA statistics and how do these number compare?
The idea was how does my son's resume stack up against the kids getting on D1 and D2 teams.
Also to identify trends in this data.
I gathered this data in two directions. First, I looked at all the South Carolina schools. Now every kid in SC doesn't play in SC. Our state high school coaches association tries to post at the SC soccer athletes that get a spot on a college team. So the data is presented as SC Schools and SC Athletes.
Spring 2014 - D1
Spring 2014 - D2
First, more information is available from the D1 schools in terms on signings. They often provide a little bio that tells their soccer background. This allows more anecdotal information to be considered. The D2 schools don't usually do this. So the conclusions are based mostly from the numbers and what little information is available.
My observations on from this small set of data;
For D1
1. D1 schools are taking a lot of academy players. Also the club players they do choose are playing at the
highest levels of youth soccer (for US Youth Soccer that is Primer teams.... at a minimum Challenge).
2. Almost 1/4 of the players recruited in D1 are foreign.
3. The South Carolina schools are only signing about 1/4 of their players from their home state.
For D2
1. Almost 1/2 of the recruits are foreign.
2. I could find few, if any, academy players signing to D2 schools.
3. Again, the South Carolina schools are only signing about 1/4 of their players from their home state.
The pursuit of academy players is kind of interesting , in that my understanding of the Academy was a way around college soccer. US Soccer does not like college soccer because of the format and schedule. It was also there way to get their hooks into the MLS academies that were already existing.
Transfers is the other source of signings. Actually more than I expected.
And of course, foreign players. How do these players end up in the US? That is a good question. My opinion is that it occurs mostly 2 ways; through friends that are already playing here and through foreign companies that sole purpose is to position foreign players at US colleges.
So what are the NCAA numbers?
US Youth Development Academy Soccer...
From the US Soccer web page
To maintain a focus on training, Academy teams do not play in any other leagues, tournaments, State Cup competitions, ODP or All-Star events without written permission from U.S. Soccer Academy staff. Full-time Academy players can only participate on their designated Academy team, with only one exception: National Team duty. For the 2014-15 season, full-time Academy players for all teams must choose to participate in the Academy full-time and forgo playing for his high school team. Please see the FAQ on the 10-month season for more information.
So where are these clubs located
So what is noticable is the large areas where kids have no access to academy teams. In the southeast, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virgina have none. My state of South Carolina has one..
To maintain a focus on training, Academy teams do not play in any other leagues, tournaments, State Cup competitions, ODP or All-Star events without written permission from U.S. Soccer Academy staff. Full-time Academy players can only participate on their designated Academy team, with only one exception: National Team duty. For the 2014-15 season, full-time Academy players for all teams must choose to participate in the Academy full-time and forgo playing for his high school team. Please see the FAQ on the 10-month season for more information.
So where are these clubs located
So what is noticable is the large areas where kids have no access to academy teams. In the southeast, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virgina have none. My state of South Carolina has one..
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