@Mwfan1921 This is starting to pique my interest.
What state are we talking about? Is this a public or private school? How many students attend this high school?
My son attends a large public school with 2,000+ students. The boys soccer team perennially makes the state tournament in the top division, and frequently does quite well. No soccer player in the last 10+ years has ever gone D1 that didn’t play varsity all four years.
@GKUnion you’re in a slightly different boat. If your son quit the DA this year and decided to play HS soccer and then for a team like Ukranian or LVU or some other successful club that does all the tournaments, he’d still be able to get D1 looks. Plus as a GK, he can do any ID clinic and get a lot of attention since he’s not competing with 18 other field players in any given game.
The caveat to my earlier comment about D1 kids in our area coming from the DA is mostly true, but it’s not uncommon for a HS senior to forgo the DA their Sr. year so they can play HS with their friends.
Let me clarify a couple of things – first, it’s not that high school offers great training or playing – playing high school does not add value to a player (in terms of recruiting!). The value definitely comes from playing high level club or DA. But, playing varsity all 4 years is a benchmark. There’s a strong correlation with the best soccer players being those who are good enough to make varsity in 9th grade.
Second – of course 9th grade boys are smaller than seniors. The best players, though smaller, can still hold their own or excel playing with older players.
One of my son’s school’s best players is a 5’3" 9th grade boy. He started every game and was one of the leading scorers. Now that’s a kid that’s likely to go D1, and likely high D1.
The d1 players I’ve seen – and there are a lot in prep school – all were unusually/exceptionally good. They stood out as 9th graders, let alone at older ages.
I completely agree with your last sentence – that it’s rare to see 4 year varsity players. (There are 1 or 2 a year in my experience). That’s why they stand out. Even then not all those kids can go d1.
Ok. I read your request for more info, and went to fact check. This is complicated, definitely went down the rabbit hole to search boys soccer commits, how many years they were on varsity, etc.
We are talking big public HS in Illinois, 4K students. Perennial powerhouse in many sports. This is what I have for boys soccer…probably won’t spend more time on it, because again…it’s hard! There is no single source for this info.
Time frame roughly the last decade, I expect there are more, especially D3.
-One 4-year varsity player to Big Ten
-Two 3-year vps to Patriot League (but one transferred in to HS for soph year, not sure where he played before then)
-Two 2-year vps to Patriot League (but one transferred in to HS for jr year, not sure where he played before then)
-One 3-year vp to Northeast 10 conference (D2)
-One 3-year vp to UAA (D3)
-One 3-year vp to North Coast conference (D3)
-Two 3-year vps to NESCAC (D3)
-One 3-year VP to Centennial (D3)
There have been a number of DA players that don’t play for the HS team who went on to play in college. A 2021 just came back to play for HS, he will likely end up at a DI.
Again this is a school that is very competitive in certain sports. Like the vball player cut junior year from the HS team, who got a D2 full tuition scholarship that I referenced above. Or the baseball player who was cut junior year, and went on to play professionally in the minors.(!)
@Mwfan1921 That was significantly more information than I expected. I appreciate the information.
Again. As I said upthread. There’s a huge difference between a freshman not making varsity and still being a legit D1 prospect later and a junior…
Based on above - at a 4000 kid school it’s 3 year varsity players who get recruited. That’s in line with my thinking.
My brother’s high school has 1200 students (all boys). This year they had 15 players sign D1 for lax on the first day of signing (assume more to come as other students will find D2 and D3 schools and even a few more D1s). Not all of those 15 played on varsity as freshmen. These schools have great freshman teams, great JV teams, etc. so everyone doesn’t play varsity.
My daughter did and it was great – I paid for the least expensive plan, made my own videos but it helped with strategies and finding athletic fit schools to contact.
Yep - my daughters high school was super competitive and she happened to be in the same class as a bunch of superstar kids… She played freshman team, then JV, then varsity but didn’t see many minutes until she was a senior. She was recruited through Club Lacrosse to a competitive D2 program
I think it was worth it. Makes the process a lot easier, but it costs like a grand for the lowest tier… 80/month. They don’t email coaches, it provides a searchable database by Athletic ability (NCSA rates the athlete via film) Academics etc… you could do all this stuff on email or Twitter, but it’s like 1 stop shopping on the coaches end. They just plug in the variables they are looking for and your kid pops up in the results. He has like 11 coaches following him and has gotten 15 emails so far