June 15 - 2022 recruiting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Final question, if your children are being sought out, tell me in your honest opinion, were your children the top 5-10% on the team, or do us parents of highly above average but no the 4 best on the team have a shot at D1?

It really depends on the team (and here I mean club team, not HS). There are teams where up to half the team go on to D1 soccer. On the girls side, FC Virginia has at least 10 D1 players (probably more) for 2020. On the boys side, the better DA teams (technically former-DA teams now) are similar; as is a top club like Baltimore Celtic. But those are the exception, and it's no coincidence--players joined those clubs and teams to have a shot at college soccer, and those teams/clubs get top players because they have a history of success at placing D1 players.

Below that level, it is more like you are saying, even for very good travel teams--maybe a couple D1 players, more D3 players.

Girls and boys recruiting is different. Boys to D1, much harder. Girls to D1 quite doable. BUT, the real question is - is the D1 school one you would attend.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can’t help but be a little upset we have not heard from any coaches.

What level is your daughter? Had her club coach told her calls were coming?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of zoom meetings, emails, phone calls and plans for more calls. It is quite taxing, but my DD only gets to do it once. She’s liking it, but overwhelmed.

What had your DD (or anyone's) done previously to be on the coaches' radar when this day came? Were they emailing coaches fresh/soph year without hearing much back? Did they go to their camps? Are they on national recruiting rankings? Did coaches see them at tourneys? I'm curious what you think the drivers of this Day One interest were.

My DS is a 2023 and looking to play D1 soccer--so a year away from the same day for him.

Go to school-specific ID camps, multiple times if possible. Seek out opportunities to play in front of coaches from schools she’s interested in. Keep letting them know she’s interested. If your team has a regular-season game near a college your DD is interested in, let that coach know day and time and jersey number. What we’re learning is that the coaches who saw our DD play multiple times and where she did a lot of outreach and made personal connections early (starting 8th grade) whether through summer programs or coaching staff at her club are the colleges where she’s getting attention now that the window is open.

Agree with all of this, except going to the same school's ID camp multiple times. I asked a D1 coach about this at one of the camps, and he told me that the school ID camp can EITHER 1) put the player on their radar OR 2) take the player off their radar. If they get on the radar because of camp performance, the school will want to see you play with your club and get to learn more about you. If you get taken off their radar, coming back to their ID camp is a waste of time.

Another couple of tips..
- Keep emailing them coaches in the year before they can contact you to reiterate your interest in the school and update them on your academic and soccer progress. Make sure the email is personal and not a form letter. i.e. provide some details in the emails about the school, and what you know about them, to let them know you've done your research
- Every time you send an email to a school, do a reply all to the last email you sent so that it's easy for the school to keep track of all your mails. A coach at a perennial top 5 program told me to do this, as they get so many emails they lose track if you create a new email each time. It helps them to understand who you are and keeps everything in context.
- If you send a link to a youtube video, keep the video private. This will allow you to use youtube's analytics features to see if the coaches have actually watched your videos. I've heard of people who actually create a different link to same video for each school, so they can see if a particular school watched. The new link is a bit excessive to me, but might be a good idea if you're really invested in a certain program and want to make sure they've watched.

My kid is a rising Junior and got emails yesterday to set up calls this week. Exciting, and sometimes overwhelming, but it looks like all the hard work and due diligence might finally pay off.

OP here. What this person said is accurate. My kid is not the best on her team, but worked hard, sent emails, ID camps, etc. D2 and D3 have been talking with her for awhile so she was hopeful for yesterday. She was pleasantly surprised. She had more calls and emails today. None of which were the schools talking to the club coaches that indicated they had interest which kind of surprised us all.

Follow what someone typed above. Put in the work off the field (soccer and recruiting).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of zoom meetings, emails, phone calls and plans for more calls. It is quite taxing, but my DD only gets to do it once. She’s liking it, but overwhelmed.

What had your DD (or anyone's) done previously to be on the coaches' radar when this day came? Were they emailing coaches fresh/soph year without hearing much back? Did they go to their camps? Are they on national recruiting rankings? Did coaches see them at tourneys? I'm curious what you think the drivers of this Day One interest were.

My DS is a 2023 and looking to play D1 soccer--so a year away from the same day for him.

Go to school-specific ID camps, multiple times if possible. Seek out opportunities to play in front of coaches from schools she’s interested in. Keep letting them know she’s interested. If your team has a regular-season game near a college your DD is interested in, let that coach know day and time and jersey number. What we’re learning is that the coaches who saw our DD play multiple times and where she did a lot of outreach and made personal connections early (starting 8th grade) whether through summer programs or coaching staff at her club are the colleges where she’s getting attention now that the window is open.

Agree with all of this, except going to the same school's ID camp multiple times. I asked a D1 coach about this at one of the camps, and he told me that the school ID camp can EITHER 1) put the player on their radar OR 2) take the player off their radar. If they get on the radar because of camp performance, the school will want to see you play with your club and get to learn more about you. If you get taken off their radar, coming back to their ID camp is a waste of time.

Another couple of tips..
- Keep emailing them coaches in the year before they can contact you to reiterate your interest in the school and update them on your academic and soccer progress. Make sure the email is personal and not a form letter. i.e. provide some details in the emails about the school, and what you know about them, to let them know you've done your research
- Every time you send an email to a school, do a reply all to the last email you sent so that it's easy for the school to keep track of all your mails. A coach at a perennial top 5 program told me to do this, as they get so many emails they lose track if you create a new email each time. It helps them to understand who you are and keeps everything in context.
- If you send a link to a youtube video, keep the video private. This will allow you to use youtube's analytics features to see if the coaches have actually watched your videos. I've heard of people who actually create a different link to same video for each school, so they can see if a particular school watched. The new link is a bit excessive to me, but might be a good idea if you're really invested in a certain program and want to make sure they've watched.

My kid is a rising Junior and got emails yesterday to set up calls this week. Exciting, and sometimes overwhelming, but it looks like all the hard work and due diligence might finally pay off.

OP here. What this person said is accurate. My kid is not the best on her team, but worked hard, sent emails, ID camps, etc. D2 and D3 have been talking with her for awhile so she was hopeful for yesterday. She was pleasantly surprised. She had more calls and emails today. None of which were the schools talking to the club coaches that indicated they had interest which kind of surprised us all.

Follow what someone typed above. Put in the work off the field (soccer and recruiting).

Congrats!! So you are saying schools that were on your radar haven’t called yet but others have?

[Anonymous]

For parents going through the 2022 recruitment, are your children playing at the ECNL level?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This has been helpful, for sure.

For those of you with experience here, are your kids playing on their HS teams or on travel programs? For either, do your coaches or the clubs help make connections or are you literally trying to seek all this out proactively? Imagine a bit of both, but curious what (if any) level of support you get from HS coaches or travel club support.

Final question, if your children are being sought out, tell me in your honest opinion, were your children the top 5-10% on the team, or do us parents of highly above average but no the 4 best on the team have a shot at D1?

For this and the last poster -
DD is playing at ECNL level. We proactively sought that out once she decided she wanted the opportunity to play D1 even if she changed her mind in 9th grade.
Playing both HS and travel, but travel club is far more important for development and showcasing.
The club honestly hasn’t done much at all. Most of this is us being proactive starting in 8th grade.
DD has been top on her team and honestly probably top 10% in the region/league for a while. She’s the kid that the parents on the opposing team comment positively on and opposing coaches casually try to recruit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of zoom meetings, emails, phone calls and plans for more calls. It is quite taxing, but my DD only gets to do it once. She’s liking it, but overwhelmed.

What had your DD (or anyone's) done previously to be on the coaches' radar when this day came? Were they emailing coaches fresh/soph year without hearing much back? Did they go to their camps? Are they on national recruiting rankings? Did coaches see them at tourneys? I'm curious what you think the drivers of this Day One interest were.

My DS is a 2023 and looking to play D1 soccer--so a year away from the same day for him.

Go to school-specific ID camps, multiple times if possible. Seek out opportunities to play in front of coaches from schools she’s interested in. Keep letting them know she’s interested. If your team has a regular-season game near a college your DD is interested in, let that coach know day and time and jersey number. What we’re learning is that the coaches who saw our DD play multiple times and where she did a lot of outreach and made personal connections early (starting 8th grade) whether through summer programs or coaching staff at her club are the colleges where she’s getting attention now that the window is open.

Agree with all of this, except going to the same school's ID camp multiple times. I asked a D1 coach about this at one of the camps, and he told me that the school ID camp can EITHER 1) put the player on their radar OR 2) take the player off their radar. If they get on the radar because of camp performance, the school will want to see you play with your club and get to learn more about you. If you get taken off their radar, coming back to their ID camp is a waste of time.

Another couple of tips..
- Keep emailing them coaches in the year before they can contact you to reiterate your interest in the school and update them on your academic and soccer progress. Make sure the email is personal and not a form letter. i.e. provide some details in the emails about the school, and what you know about them, to let them know you've done your research
- Every time you send an email to a school, do a reply all to the last email you sent so that it's easy for the school to keep track of all your mails. A coach at a perennial top 5 program told me to do this, as they get so many emails they lose track if you create a new email each time. It helps them to understand who you are and keeps everything in context.
- If you send a link to a youtube video, keep the video private. This will allow you to use youtube's analytics features to see if the coaches have actually watched your videos. I've heard of people who actually create a different link to same video for each school, so they can see if a particular school watched. The new link is a bit excessive to me, but might be a good idea if you're really invested in a certain program and want to make sure they've watched.

My kid is a rising Junior and got emails yesterday to set up calls this week. Exciting, and sometimes overwhelming, but it looks like all the hard work and due diligence might finally pay off.

Way to go dad! Way to take the lead for your DD.

Really, dude? If that's your big takeaway from that post, you have some serious issues. Asking college coaches a few simple questions, helping my daughter learn how to make her own highlight videos, helping her to navigate through this long, complex process is not me taking "the lead". My 15 year old led. I'm her support staff, and it's been working out for her so far, based on her contact with coaches these past 2 days. Maybe instead of being a dick, you can refocus that asshole energy into something constructive, and let us know how your kid's recruiting process is going and what worked/didn't work for her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This has been helpful, for sure.

For those of you with experience here, are your kids playing on their HS teams or on travel programs? For either, do your coaches or the clubs help make connections or are you literally trying to seek all this out proactively? Imagine a bit of both, but curious what (if any) level of support you get from HS coaches or travel club support.

Final question, if your children are being sought out, tell me in your honest opinion, were your children the top 5-10% on the team, or do us parents of highly above average but no the 4 best on the team have a shot at D1?

I'm the previous who posted the tips about the emails and youtube videos. My kids plays on an ECNL team, not located in the Mid-Atlantic region. She played HS as a Freshman, and had a lot of fun doing it, but decided this year to skip HS soccer and train year-round with her club. She is not top 5-10% on her club team. She is a part-time starter, but her team has been one of the top teams in the country in that age group for years, so they get a lot of looks from college scouts.

Our club and coach offer advice on recruiting, but don't proactively make connections for us. We, as a family, had to do just about all of the heavy lifting(emails, camps, videos, etc.) ourselves. The best thing we did was go to as many school specific ID camps as we could. Although she was only a part time starter on her team, she was able to stand out at the camps she attended. More than half of the schools that contacted her in the past two days were schools where she attended their camps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of zoom meetings, emails, phone calls and plans for more calls. It is quite taxing, but my DD only gets to do it once. She’s liking it, but overwhelmed.

What had your DD (or anyone's) done previously to be on the coaches' radar when this day came? Were they emailing coaches fresh/soph year without hearing much back? Did they go to their camps? Are they on national recruiting rankings? Did coaches see them at tourneys? I'm curious what you think the drivers of this Day One interest were.

My DS is a 2023 and looking to play D1 soccer--so a year away from the same day for him.

Go to school-specific ID camps, multiple times if possible. Seek out opportunities to play in front of coaches from schools she’s interested in. Keep letting them know she’s interested. If your team has a regular-season game near a college your DD is interested in, let that coach know day and time and jersey number. What we’re learning is that the coaches who saw our DD play multiple times and where she did a lot of outreach and made personal connections early (starting 8th grade) whether through summer programs or coaching staff at her club are the colleges where she’s getting attention now that the window is open.

Agree with all of this, except going to the same school's ID camp multiple times. I asked a D1 coach about this at one of the camps, and he told me that the school ID camp can EITHER 1) put the player on their radar OR 2) take the player off their radar. If they get on the radar because of camp performance, the school will want to see you play with your club and get to learn more about you. If you get taken off their radar, coming back to their ID camp is a waste of time.

Another couple of tips..
- Keep emailing them coaches in the year before they can contact you to reiterate your interest in the school and update them on your academic and soccer progress. Make sure the email is personal and not a form letter. i.e. provide some details in the emails about the school, and what you know about them, to let them know you've done your research
- Every time you send an email to a school, do a reply all to the last email you sent so that it's easy for the school to keep track of all your mails. A coach at a perennial top 5 program told me to do this, as they get so many emails they lose track if you create a new email each time. It helps them to understand who you are and keeps everything in context.
- If you send a link to a youtube video, keep the video private. This will allow you to use youtube's analytics features to see if the coaches have actually watched your videos. I've heard of people who actually create a different link to same video for each school, so they can see if a particular school watched. The new link is a bit excessive to me, but might be a good idea if you're really invested in a certain program and want to make sure they've watched.

My kid is a rising Junior and got emails yesterday to set up calls this week. Exciting, and sometimes overwhelming, but it looks like all the hard work and due diligence might finally pay off.

OP here. What this person said is accurate. My kid is not the best on her team, but worked hard, sent emails, ID camps, etc. D2 and D3 have been talking with her for awhile so she was hopeful for yesterday. She was pleasantly surprised. She had more calls and emails today. None of which were the schools talking to the club coaches that indicated they had interest which kind of surprised us all.

Follow what someone typed above. Put in the work off the field (soccer and recruiting).

Congrats!! So you are saying schools that were on your radar haven’t called yet but others have?

Yes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For parents going through the 2022 recruitment, are your children playing at the ECNL level?

PP, my DD played DA, now GA. She’s also played ECNL, but chose DA instead.

[Anonymous]

DD is not a 2022 - she is close but not there yet. But I want to give a shout out to her club. Arlington GA has been on it. She’s had webinars on how to make her highlight video, one on one zoom calls with her coach going over her video, reviewing her intro email, counseling her on school choices.
I (as a parent) haven’t had to do much.
Not sure how proactive the coach will be with reaching out to schools, etc. but so far we’ve been pleasantly surprised.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DD is not a 2022 - she is close but not there yet. But I want to give a shout out to her club. Arlington GA has been on it. She’s had webinars on how to make her highlight video, one on one zoom calls with her coach going over her video, reviewing her intro email, counseling her on school choices.
I (as a parent) haven’t had to do much.
Not sure how proactive the coach will be with reaching out to schools, etc. but so far we’ve been pleasantly surprised.

I agree. Arlington GA is really upping their game in college recruiting.

[Anonymous]

One tip I have for those going through this is to research whether the schools under consideration offer scholarships that are "guaranteed" for four years (meaning the scholarship can not be reduced or canceled for athletic reasons). This article provides a good overview: https://informedathlete.com/the-facts-about-guaranteed-multi-year-ncaa-di-scholarships/

All of the Power 5 conferences (ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, PAC-12, and SEC) plus Notre Dame are bound by this rule, and a number of other university athletic programs have voluntarily adopted it. If you are receiving a scholarship at one of these schools, you will have much more peace of mind about the total costs you'll be paying.

[Anonymous]

anyone know of any college ID men's soccer camps being held anywhere in the US in July or August?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For parents going through the 2022 recruitment, are your children playing at the ECNL level?

Previous DA player. Now Girls Development. not ECNL