As a high-achieving HS kid myself who then went on to do badly in college (flunked out, in fact!), yeah, whatever, I totally recognize that when someone makes a statement that “high-achieving kids do X” they’re talking about averages, not specifics—I honestly don’t see the problem in offering evidence-based (or even observation-based) generalizations as generalizations without tons of hedging.
(I did quite well educationally later on, but it took extra time, money, and stress. Same as for most kids who end up going down the same path as I did, in fact.)