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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The ECNL College Impact for the Ivy League Conference includes all players currently active on Ivy League rosters:

Nov. 2018

138 ECNL Alums are currently playing in the Ivy League Conference.
Ivy League Offensive Player of the Year (Mimi Asom), Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year (Camillia Nwokedi) and Ivy League Rookie of the Year (Rebecca Rosen) are ECNL Alums.

6 of 12 players on the All-Ivy League First Team are ECNL Alums.

The Ivy League Conference includes Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University and Yale University.[/quote]

It is just stunning that ECNL teams established long before DA have college commitments.

But what does that mean for your 8th grader who is entering into a far more fractured soccer landscape? ECNL, ECNL 2, DA, NPL, EDP and more.

So lets drop all pretenses. Pugh played in ECNL in a very different time. It seems hard to say but 4 years is forever now in youth soccer. She played in High School because she was so good no coach would ever tell her no. She also played in a league that WAS the destination. In fact ECNL was only formed as a reaction of US Soccer's failure to launch a girls DA when they launched the boys. This only illustrates my point about women's sports being marginalized.

My kid isn't national team material and neither is yours. My kid is an above average player but nothing special. I'll presume that your kid is likely pretty similar. There isn't much difference between our kids because there is just nothing special about them. But, for sake of argument, lets just say that both our kids want to play in college. I think this is a safe assumption since they are playing in either DA or ECNL. With the current landscape so fractured just being on the field of an ECNL or DA team is no longer the separator that it once was from say a CCL player. Because with the fractured landscape brings dilution.

When ECNL was King the fact that Pugh played HS was actually noteworthy because HS was frowned upon by ECNL coaches. ECNL coaches discouraged it and as long as they were the only game in town they could get away with it. It was risky for a bench player or a starter to play HS and risk losing ECNL playing time or even a roster spot. ECNL simply saw a market weakness in DA and used it to exploit nostalgia in parents and promote the illusion of "choice" when just 4 years ago the very same league did not provide it openly or as willingly.

ECNL coaches all argued the exact same reasons then to discourage HS soccer as the DA does now. So yes, it is nice that NOW ECNL is suddenly the Champion of choice and HS Soccer but it is simply for money and not your DD's true best interests for their sudden change of heart.

So with all that said, and nearly 200 "Elite" teams between ECNL and DA for college coaches to look at players the ability to stand out is even more difficult than ever before you believe that giving up 4 months of quality training for HS soccer is really worth it?

I'll say Freshman and Senior year sure, but Sophomore and Junior? No way. But, because ECNL has restructured to accommodate the HS schedule, when it did not do so before if you choose ECNL then you just might as well play HS because for those four months there is just really no longer a ECNL option anymore. They have literally turned themselves into a 6 month training environment.

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