Our daughter is currently a Freshman in High School plays Club (one of the major clubs in our competitive area) and has been a Goal Keeper exclusively for about three years.
She also has a Goal Keeper trainer as much of what they do at team practice is for field players.
We are a more academically-inclined family and never anticipated athletics being a part of the conversation as far as college applications.
She has excellent grades at one of the three top (academically) schools in the state. She takes all Honors and AP options provided. She is too young to have taken her standardized tests yet but she does have a couple of significant academic awards.
She does not need any scholarship money so that is not an issue for her.
She would like to choose the best school for her academic (and later career) interests. Would playing soccer in college be helpful to her college application prospects?
I only started thinking about this recently as she participated in a showcase that I have come to understand is one of the top national showcases and she did really well.
I have started setting up profiles for her and we are getting a highlights tape put together very soon just in case.
She has not yet come up with a list of possible colleges although that will likely happen in the next 6 months.
I have heard that she is already “late” to be thinking about this in Feeshman year and that girls in 2022 are already being recruited.
I am also not sure how to approach the whole ID camp issue. Ideally you know what schools interest you and then pick camps but we aren’t there yet.
I would appreciate comments from experienced athletes and parents — specific to female soccer gk.
she’s not late for D3 (Williams, Amherst, chicago, MIT, etc…) if that’s something you are interested in. For D1 it’s about now. For top W soccer programs 70% of their classes are “committed” by the end of Freshman year for girls. Probably 90% for top 20 soccer programs by end of sophomore year. D3 will take a look earlier but until they get test scores it doesn’t really matter. D3 timeline is junior year. Do be aware that Ivy league wants top 0.1% soccer player but only top 5% tile student (based on 30ACT score needed). There’s a reason Princeton WSOC beat NC State, Wake Forest and UNC all in the same year 2 years ago and it’s not due to the classroom
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I do not believe she is a candidate for D1 as she is too short. I have assumed that short plus great skills means D3 (and only if she is very lucky). But — I really do not know much about this.
Ivy League is so competitive both with athletics and academics that statistically those seem unlikely options even for a great student with a strong spike.
Instead of looking at the top 1-10 schools (academically) we assume she will be looking at schools ranked 60-11.
Ok D1 is probably what I was hearing about. I am glad to know that the D3 timeline is further off.
So do Ivy League/other top academic schools also recruit for D1 this early? Grades can really evolve over the course of a kid’s high school career (not always in the right direction) and it seems odd to recruit a 14 year old in 9th grade and need her to be .1 percentile as far as athletics and 5 percentile as far as academics by 12th grade. I would think kids often cannot maintain that over four years.
Yes. Being a recruited athlete is a big hook at many schools.
It’s not too late. How tall is she and how much further do you think she’ll grow? Taller keepers have an advantage, but obviously quickness and footwork have to be good or great as well.
What level does her club team play?
She is only about 5’2 now and I don’t think she will get much more height. She really is too short for D1 and for all I know possibly too short even for D3.
And this is very silly but I did mention that we are not a sports family — and I don’t even know what you are asking for when you ask for level. Would it be on her team’s page on the soccer rankings websites?
Maybe someone who’s in youth soccer NOW can chime in, since I’ve been out of the soccer merry-go-round for a while. US Soccer is changing the structure again, but does she play in a Development Academy, National/Regional or a Premier League?
I think ideally, a D1 college GK would be ROUGHLY 5’7-6’2". I’m not as familiar with D3. Of course, there are always outliers/exceptions.
Ah now I understand. Her Club has different levels usually three at this age with the top level being a Pre-Academy team which feeds into an Academy team. She is on the team below the Pre-Academy team.
Ok so this is helpful — she will just never be tall enough not for D1 or D3. I checked online and it looks like the heights for GK are going up across the board with 5’8 being low end.
FWIW, I know a girl who’s 5’11-6’0", played on a top youth DA team in the region/country for her age group and didn’t get a college offer, so height doesn’t guarantee you anything. The shorter GK on the same team had college offers, but decided to stop playing soccer and now goes to Stanford.
Again, ivy league girls soccer is roughly top10 to top 30 mostly compared to D1 schools. If your kid is not able to play at a top30-40 soccer D1 it is unlikely HYP, columbia, penn would take them. Darmouth and cornell drop down in soccer quality.
I know a boy GK who played striker for the first time his senior year in high school, and he’s been recruited as a striker. He is D3 and I know him personally; I’ve heard of another gk going d1, also as a striker. To say – perhaps she might try another position (if she really is too short for gk in college).
The best thing you can do is ask her club coach for his/her assessment of your daughter’s level.
So I was told by her coach that we are a club level team that plays in local premier league games. I believe someone on this thread had asked.
I think they were asking if your daughter plays DA (development academy - not allowed to play for her highschool team without a waiver), ECNL (elite club national league), NPL (national premier league - fair amount of travel even within your region). Club level doesn’t mean anything as far as I know. If it’s a club team, vs a town team, then it’s a club team. Do you play regular season games in other states?
5’2” is probably too small to be even a D3 goalie unless she’s the most amazingly athletic kid. How close to the cross bar can she get? I wouldn’t let that stop you from proceeding but I would keep expectations realistic.
Your club coach should give you an idea of what level she can play in college or give you some colleges that would be target schools athletically.
I am hoping that even the D1 recruiting madness slows down a bit because of the new ncaa rules.
This is so helpful thank you.
No she is just on a Club Level team apparently.
We participate in premier league games locally and yes we travel throughout our region a fair amount frequently going to different states.
The season avoids fall season so kids can play high school soccer for their high school teams.
Team did just return from LVP Showcase.
Good to know about the height issue. No I think it is unlikely that she could transition to striker. I don’t think she would be faster than the other girls. Although she is a sprinter and in her goal she is always faster than anyone else. Walking off the field another coach at the showcase laughed and told her she should be a field player because she had to run so much (a lot of breakaways that game).
Also at the club everyone has a specific position — that is why each girl is on the team.
The thing about athletic recruiting (and especially GK recruiting) is that you just don’t know. I know of a rather short female GK that was recruited to a fine academic D3 school. As I am sure you know, pretty much only the no. 1 goalkeeper plays – until she doesn’t. So this creates a fluid situation. Most recruits don’t want to sit on the bench for four years, so there is attrition. For any given year, there may be more need for a team than goalkeepers (particularly backups). In this respect, some degree of flexibility would be an asset (i.e., committing to a college that you did not anticipate committing to or that may not have every single quality that you are looking for).
The difficulty in recruiting is for the athlete to make an emotional commitment to the process, and still not be disappointed if it doesn’t work out. Starting early could help. I would recommend getting tapes made to send to coaches now. Remember, filming just one game is not going to be enough for a keeper. Who knows how many SOG are going to happen for a single game, and there are many skills you are going to want to showcase (saves, coming off line, punts, 6 kicks, other distribution). With size being an issue, you also are going to want to show the ability to save high shots. If you send tapes to the coaches now, and make a few college visits to meet with coaches (perhaps over the summer), you can see if the process is gaining any traction.
No GK specific knowledge, but I do think this summer is on the early side to meet with D3 coaches (not too early to contact coaches though, and your D can’t meet with DI or DII until junior year). College coaches at any level can speak with your club coach at anytime. Other things:
Fill out the online recruiting questionnaires
Contact coaches by email, send highlight video
Create a twitter account, pin the highlight video at the top. Follow programs and coaches of interest, retweet their tweets.
Make a list of factors that your D wants in a college. She may have two lists of schools–those where she can perhaps play soccer, those where she can’t. Don’t overlook club soccer at DI/DII schools–if she loves soccer this could provide a good balance – some of the club teams play at a high level, higher than some D3 teams.
@Mwfan1921 - quick question: if D1 coaches can’t meet with kids till their junior year, how can those girls be offered scholarships as sophomores? (we know a D1 who had an offer her sophomore year.) How does all of that work? someone mentioned new NCAA rules . . . know what they are? ~~~thanks.