The college soccer recruiting process is often mysterious, mercurial, and frustrating. Perhaps the ultimate U.S. soccer insider, Steve Gans, provides parents with a roadmap and gameplan for navigating the process from youth club soccer to recruitment to a college soccer program. In this book, Steve explains each step in the college recruiting process as well as the ways that players and parents can best prepare for them. Topics include:
- Engaging recruiting coaches
- Creating highlight videos
- Selecting Identification Camps
- Evaluating Showcase Tournaments
- Considering MLS Next (boys) or ECNL (girls) options
- Weighing MLS Next vs. high school
- Dealing with recruiting coach departures
- Understanding College Draft Boards
- The potential impact of playing out of position for your club
- Recruiting services your club should provide
- The pros and cons of having college coaches at your club
- Dealing with the unpredictability of and within the process
This book includes 7 interviews with top college coaches to help you understand firsthand what these coaches look for in a player and the recruiting approach of each of them.
The book begins, and is interspersed, with the college soccer recruiting journeys of Steve's sons, Noah and Josh, and the unexpected recruiting developments faced by them. The lessons learned from those experiences are instrumental in Steve paying it forward by providing parents and players with both recruiting tips and traps for the unwary. As Steve will attest, each soccer recruiting story is personal, and by approaching the process armed with knowledge and a sense of what to expect, each player and their family will have the best chance possible for recruiting success for that player.
