This initial post will be (like last year) only a note of the early commitments. Any serious look at the composition of the 2021 recruiting class will have to wait for several more years until there are sufficient numbers to make any real statistical sense. Bottom line? At this point in time the recruitment of very young players in women's college soccer is accelerating. Last year there were no known commitments in the 2020 class by this time (July) and there were three commitments by November. This year, there are already 11 known commitments from kids who have not yet entered high school. I think I am past the hand wringing stage and am consigned to accepting the reality that this is simply the trend as more DI programs feel compelled to secure the talent early before other schools make their moves regardless of the possibility (or should I say probability) that the player may not continue the early promise seen today. We've thoroughly discussed this issue for several years. The 11 commits for 2021 are mostly the highest ranked players, with a few exceptions. I am currently tracking about 70 players and the top 6 are now spoken for. Texas once again leads the pack with three commitments the earliest being a year ago from Alexis Missimo who had just finished her 7th grade year. The other Texas commits are fellow Texan Trinity Byars, and Tatiana Fung from Southern California. (The three above all are in my top ten .... but may not be 4+ years from now.) Rutgers also has three commitments at this time. Top rated keeper Mia Justus has committed as has Faith Slimmer and Riley Tiernan. All three of these players are from New Jersey. Southern California has committed top ten player Kayla Colbert, and Penn State is in the mix with committed Jillian Shimkin from New York, also a top player. Further down the food chain, Boston College has committed to local player Lilly Reale, Texas Tech to Macy Blackburn, and Minnesota to Khyah Harper. It is interesting to note that, with the exception this year of USC and a lower pick to BC, the two top conference schools (ACC and PAC 12) are not involved and will predictably start garnering committed players starting in December and especially next spring.... still early by historic standards, but not by the standards of the past 5 years. Give this another year and we'll take another look. Cheers!
Whatever happened to SoccerBg? I don't think his spreadsheet blog and twitter account (except for Mal Pugh leaving UCLA) has been updated since January. He was such a great resource. https://twitter.com/soccercbg?lang=en https://twitter.com/soccercbg?lang=en
Shame on all those schools. Those kids are just entering their freshman year and are committed before they've even had chance to enjoy high school? Actions by all those schools is disgusting.
Well, it'll be interesting to see how many of those superstars are actually contributing players by sophomore year in college. I can think of 4-5 can't miss kids in their SENIOR years of his who became second string, transferred because they weren't playing, or just stopped playing altogether. Then there is the question over the offers to those freshmen are even honored.
Yes, I agree that his spreadsheet was invaluable. Unfortunately, he had a day job that became busy (lots of travel) and he simply couldn't keep up the herculean effort he had been maintaining for going on 9 years to provide us WoSo enthusiasts with up to date and accurate recruiting information. I had feared for years that he would eventually burn out, and he finally did. In retrospect we owe him a huge thank you for the 8.5 years he hung in there to all of our benefit.