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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Boy D1 soccer. Was clear that was his likely path by age 12, 7th grade. [/quote]

The problem is 99% of parents with 12-year old boy travel players on top teams at that she think they same.  It rarely pans out.[/quote]
We did not find this to be the case, but we were on a high-level team where virtually every kid had one or more very knowledgeable soccer parents (DH in my case), and the families who didn’t sought out advice from those who did. If you polled all the knowledgeable parents on the team about which kids at 12 had college potential if they kept their grades up, the results would have been at least 75% accurate. I agree that a parent who does not know the game is not going to be able to make that prediction, and kids can go in a variety of directions depending on personalities and circumstances.[/quote]

Like Hampden Sydney, Christopher Newport, Randolph Macon, Mount St. Mary's to play?  I have seen pretty much zero boys going to UNC, Stanford, Duke, UCLA, UVA, etc. from this area.  I have been watching the commits at my kid's big Club (considered one of the best in the DMV) since 2010 and the neighboring MLSNxt Club's commits.  There were a few that went over to DC United academy, but not many top colleges/programs. The girls were different, of course.

I have seen so many parents who told me their kid had 'pro potential' or would play D1 when these boys were little.  Most had dropped the Club after Junior year of HS when it was apparent that wasn't panning out.  I saw some families drive 1,000s upon 1,000s of miles and fly too and dump so much time and effort and to come up short.  I am one of the parents you talk about-pro in the family and several D1 players (who I'm not sure would be D1 with the huge landscape and number of foreign players taking college spots today).

Where was your Club? I'd be very interested to know.   [/quote]
What club commits were you looking at? In recent years BSC has sent boys to most Ivies (Harvard, Penn, Dartmouth, Princeton, Cornell), Stanford, Duke, Georgetown, and plenty of other good D1 schools plus several academically excellent D3s. None of the kids on the top couple of teams suddenly blossomed or tanked (barring injury) when they were 15 or 16 and ended up with very different options from what was expected in late MS.  Of course lots of kids at all levels at all clubs will end up choosing a school based on academic fit alone and will forgo recruitment.

I’m not sure why this seems to be such controversial notion. It’s pretty obvious whether a kid is a good athlete by 11 or 12 in most cases, right?  If you combine good athletes, good training with other competitive kids, parents who value academics and education and generally have plenty of discretionary income (which describes most families who gravitate to BSC and similar clubs in other areas) and years of hard work, your odds of ending up as a recruitable athlete are pretty good. I’d noted in my earlier post that a knowledgeable parent or coach can often make a pretty good prediction in MS about what a kid’s ceiling is IF that kid continues playing AND has good academics.  I’m not suggesting that any random parent who doesn’t know the game or how recruitment works can do the same.  And it’s not surprising that kids who play for DCUnited often end up with fewer elite college admissions no matter their academic talents. Kids there who are talented enough athletically that a pro-career is realistic are going to be doing online school their last couple years of HS, and that makes it tough to get into some schools whose coaches would be delighted to have them. [/quote]

If by previous years, you mean prior to the change in the transfer rules, then that’s pretty irrelevant to the current D1 recruiting landscape. Most D1 recruits from prior to the change would not be D1 recruits now. [/quote]
I’m talking about recruits from the HS Classes of 2018-22. It goes without saying that any assessment of athletic recruitability occurring before a player commits/signs an NLI will be made based on the rules in place at the time of the assessment. [/quote]

Of course, but what you don’t seem to understand is just how radically the transfer portal change has impacted HS senior recruiting for men’s soccer (frankly also men’s football and basketball). Recruiting prior to 2021 is not at all indicative of recruiting now. To give just one example of the change, some D1 coaches have stopped going to college showcases they used to always attend, because they know they won’t look at [i]any[/i] high school seniors. The change is profound.

Essentially men’s soccer is moving to a model more similar to men’s hockey, where the expectation is that kids who want to play D1 will play juniors first. [/quote]

No there is a huge difference between the highest level club soccer and pro development. The players in the USL are vastly better vs college. The speed of play, athleticism, professional training, etc. [/quote]

Uh, yes? Nobody disputes that USL plays at a higher level than club, so I have no idea why you even bring it up. That has nothing to do with this conversation. Are you the person who somehow believes that what happened in 2018 in Bethesda soccer is remotely relevant to D1 soccer recruiting today? [/quote]
I’m the BSC poster and have not written about USL. You are straying far off topic. This is not a thread about transfer portals or D1 soccer recruiting; it’s about the age at which it’s possible to project a kid’s athletic ability into the future regardless of the sport or level they may ultimately attain if they stay the course.  Why don’t you answer the OP’s question instead of attacking others? [/quote]

It is entirely on-topic, but you are attacking me because you don’t like today’s college recruiting landscape for men’s soccer, which is what I am talking about. You are angry at me for describing the reality of men’s college soccer recruiting. I’m sorry, but you are shooting the messenger here.

The question in OP is at what age it is possible to predict whether a child plays athletics in college. For men’s soccer, that answer is significantly impacted by the recent changes to the transfer portal, because kids who used to be good candidates for D1 (or even D2/D3) are now no longer candidates. Kids who four years ago would have been obvious candidates when they were in 10th grade are no longer such obvious candidates, because so few kids are recruited to teams as seniors at this point. That change is causing a ripple effect: kids who were obvious candidates for D1 as sophomores/juniors four years ago are now maybe looking at D2/D3 feeder programs to D1, and hoping to transfer. And kids who four years ago would have been identified as D3 candidates at about the same time are now looking to play club. The point is that in order to accurately answer OPs question for men’s soccer, you need to understand just how profoundly recruiting has changed for the sport.

I mean, if you prefer we could just say that statistically your child’s odds of playing D1 men’s soccer as a freshman are vanishingly low and getting sharply lower, and just leave it at that.[/quote]

I don't understand what you're saying. The total number of roster spots are the same. Top programs recruiting via the transfer portal just means open spots at the schools they are pulling those transfers from; the total number of players remains unchanged. [/quote]

Every single year in men’s soccer for the past ten years the percentage of international players has risen. Also, the number of NCAA mens soccer teams has stayed essentially static even while interest in the sport has soared.  In 1996 there were 197 mens D1 teams. Today there are 205 mens D1 programs. Let’s say each D1 team has a roster of 30. You can do the math.

So no, the total number of roster spots available for a HS senior is not staying the same over the years. Also, it’s unlikely that the D1 schools will pull junior transfers very heavily from academically good D3 schools because D3 athletes lose so much training ground in the spring.  They aren’t allowed to train in the spring very much at all, so they can’t compete with athletes at lower D1 programs, D2 programs, and international recruits.

Essentially your HS senior has almost no chance of playing D1 mens soccer as a freshman. [/quote]

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